Civil 3-D PROFILE CREATION 1 Alignment Overview: As in previous CAD versions, an alignment is a line that describes where you intend the centerline of your planned work to be. That s all. But, in Civil 3D, that line is interactive with your profile, both existing ground and planned work. In Autodesk Civil 3D, you create alignments as objects. Use the Prospector and Settings tabs to manage alignments in Toolspace. Alignments are listed in a Site collection in the Prospector tab where you have options to change properties, generate reports, and export the data as an XML file. Use the Settings tab in Toolspace to manage the specific settings for the alignment object styles, label and table styles, and command settings. Control the visual appearance of alignment components and labels through styles. You can create specific styles to use in the various phases of a project. Profile Overview Using profiles, you can view changes in elevation along a horizontal alignment. In addition to the centerline profile, you can create offset profiles for features such as waterway or ditch banks. Create a Profile View to see one or more of the profiles associated with a horizontal alignment. Use the Profile View of a surface as a guide for creating the finished grade profile of a designed surface, such as a waterway. On a profile view, you can also superimpose the profile of a different horizontal alignment that is in the same area. And like LandDesktop you can create a temporary profile (Quick Section now called Quick Profile) that can help you view information at locations where there is no alignment (i.e. line, polyline, feature, or along a series of points you select). Let s Cad 1. Start by creating an Alignment: a. From the screen menu Alignments Create by layout b. You get a dialog box, Create Alignment Layout. i. Give your alignment a relevant name (i.e. 10 WW). ii. Leave the rest of the defaults alone. iii. Hit OK. c. You ll get a toolbar called Alignment Layout Tools i. Pick Draw Tangent-Tangent without curves ii. (It s on the far left, a blue triangle with red legs) iii. Starting at 0+00, draw the centerline of your alignment. The alignment will label itself. iv. When you get to end of your alignment, just Esc. The Layout tool bar will disappear. 2. Common Alignment Errors: a. Let s say you accidentally started your alignment at the wrong end, resulting in 0+00 were you don t want it. Go to Alignments Reverse Alignment Direction, select your alignment, click OK on the warning message, and your alignment will automatically become reversed! b. Forget a point or add one you didn t want? Go to Alignments Edit Alignment Geometry, the first few buttons allow you to fix your mistake similar to LandDesktop.
3. Now its time to create a Profile: a. From the screen menu Profiles Create from Surface b. You ll get a Create Profile from Surface dialog box. i. Edit the stations you wish to assign the profile to, as needed. c. Pick small box marked Sample Offsets. When the window enables, enter your planned bank shots and centerline shots relative to the alignment (i.e. -15,0,15)* i. Left bank and right banks, in this case, are sampled 15 off centerline. And the centerline is sampled right on the alignment. ii. *Note: sample distances left of centerline are designated as a negative distance d. Pick the Add button. The data will show up in the Profile List. 2 e. Click on the Style button. i. Double Click and Assign Left Bank EGL and Right Bank EGR to the appropriate samplings (Centerline should have EGCL as a default). ii. Pick OK. f. Click OK on the Create Profile from Surface dialog box, Close the Panorama Window
g. From the screen menu: Profiles Create View i. You ll get a Create Profile View dialog box. Give the Profile View a name. ii. Pick OK. iii. Pick a spot on the screen to place the Profile. iv. Close out the Panorama Window Events that annoyingly pops up. 3 4. Edit the way the profile looks by picking anywhere on the profile, (the whole thing lights up). a. For instance, if you want more exaggeration in the profile: Right-click (RC) on the graph Choose Edit Profile View Style Go to the Graph tab and change the vertical exaggeration to a higher number. Pick OK 5. Create Finished Ground CL a. From the screen menu: Profiles Create By Layout You ll get a pick box. i. Pick Anywhere on Profile. You get a Create Profile-Draw new dialog box. ii. Give your FG a name (CLWW) iii. Click OK b. The Profile Layout Tools toolbar will automatically popup. i. Choose Draw Tangents without Curves (It s on the far left, 2 green lines coming off a yellow point). ii. Starting at the beginning of your profile (0+00), draw-roughly-the grades and grade breaks (PVI s) you want across the profile. iii. When done, hit enter. c. To edit the line to exact grades, grade changes, and/or elevations, i. Pick the FG line you just drew. Right-click. ii. From the menu, choose Edit Profile Geometry a. You ll get a Profile Layout Tools toolbar. b. Choose Profile Grid View (Toward the right-hand side of the toolbar, a white box with a blue edge). c. The Panorama Window opens up and you can edit grades, grade break locations, and elevations as needed by double-clicking in the boxes and editing the numbers. d. You can remove or add a grade break by picking the appropriate tool on the Profile Layout Tools dialog box. e. Hit Enter when done. Then hit Esc
6. To have the profile view show the final grades and elevations: a. Pick the FG centerline itself (lights up). Right click and select Edit Labels b. Under the Type Column change the Style of: i. Choose Lines change Style to be FG ii. Choose Grade Breaks change Style to be FG-CL iii. Eliminate any other Label Types in the box by highlighting them and picking the big red X at the top of the box. All we want to see on the FG profile are Lines and Grade Breaks iv. Use the slider at the bottom of the dialog box to view the column marked Weeding. Make sure all the values are 0.00. v. Pick OK. On the Graph, the Finished Ground Tangent will have the grades and the PVI elevations and stations. (Sometimes the PVI s don t plot if the stations are too close together. That means you didn t change the weeding to 0.00.) 4
c. Pick anywhere on the profile Grid. Right-click. Choose Profile View Properties You will get a dialog box by the same name. i. Pick the Bands tab. ii. For the Left-Right Banks tab make sure the Profile 1 column has the left bank data (remember, left is always a negative number, -#) and Profile 2 column has right-bank data (#). iii. For the Center-FG profile data, make sure Profile 1 column has the EG centerline data and Profile 2 column has FG data. iv. When finished, hit OK. Elevation data on the bottom of the graph should match the profile lines, existing and finished ground. 5 7. Creating a Channel Template From Scratch: You now have a valid profile. In older versions of Land Desktop, you d have the opportunity to create channel templates to apply to the profile. Civil 3D breaks this into Subassemblies which combine to make an Assembly with which, you build Corridors. There are no usable pre-made channel assemblies at this time. You ll have to create what you want. The process is relatively easy, but you have to lie to the program to do it since it thinks your building a concrete road with a thick subbase. a. In the menu Corridors, pick Create Assembly. i. You ll get a dialog box titled Create Assembly. ii. Gave your Assembly a name like 10 WW. iii. Pick OK. iv. The Command Line prompts the question: Assembly baseline location? (The Assembly Baseline is the centerline of the cross-section of your planned channel. You need to pick a spot on the screen to place it.) v. You get a vertical line with a circle or triangle at the midpoint. This is the frame that defines your assembly. All your subassemblies must attach to this to register as assemblies.
b. In the menu Corridors, pick Subassembly Tool Palettes. i. You ll see an extensive dialog box organized with tabs. Look for the tab marked Imperial Basic We ll use this to create the bottom of the channel. ii. You can use either BasicLane or BasicLaneTransition. Pick one of them. iii. On your screen, you need to be able to see the Assembly Baseline you just created. 6 c. A dialog box appears with 2 main divisions: Go to Advanced, Parameters: i. You see the column marked Side. Left and Right designate which side of the centerline (Assembly Baseline) you ll be building. Under the Side row, you ll see Width, Depth and Slope. a. Width. This is width left and right of the centerline. A 10 foot width bottom would have a Default Width of 5 ft. each side of the centerline. Change the default width to 5. b. Depth, if you were building a road, would be the thickness of your concrete lane. This is not a road. Under Depth, type in a really small number like 0.0001. The program will round the number off to 0.0. c. Below that Slope indicates the degree of crown on the roadway. Type in a really small number like 0.0001. The program will round this number off to 0.0% too. ii. You ll notice on the main screen you have a Pick box. Pick the little circle or triangle at the midpoint of your Assembly Baseline. a. Depending on whether you had Left or Right chosen, half the bottom of your waterway will attach itself to your baseline assembly. d. Switch the Left/Right setting in the dialog box and pick the midpoint again to get the other half of your channel bottom. e. Escape when you are done.
f. To change the rest of the Subassembly properties click on either the left or right subassembly so it is highlighted, right click, and select Subassembly Properties i. Go to the Parameters Tab and change the following: a. Depth, below that, would be the thickness of your concrete lane. Under Depth, type in a really small number like 0.0001. The program will round the number off to 0.0. b. Below that Slope indicates the degree of crown on the roadway. Type in a really small number like 0.001. The program will round this number off to 0.0% too. c. Width. This is width left and right of center. A 10 foot width bottom would have a Default Width of 5 ft. each side of the centerline. Change the default width to 5. ii. You will notice the difference in your subassembly. iii. Exit out of the properties box, and change the setting on the other subassembly. 7 g. Now, from Subassembly Tool Palettes, pick the tab marked Imperial Generic. i. A little past half way to the bottom, you ll pick LinkSlopeToSurface. ii. You ll see the same type of dialog box with Basic, and Advanced. Go to Advanced, Parameters: This is basically the same process, only this time you are creating the left and right sideslopes of your channel. iii. In this process you need change only the Left/Right setting and convert your sideslopes to percent (i.e. 8:1 = 12.5%).
Here s the scoop: The only way I ve been able to do this successfully, is to attach the left and right sideslopes to the same center point that the bottom subassemblies were attached to and then move them to the edge. iv. Attach the sideslopes to midpoint of the Assembly Baseline. (See below). 8 v. Then manually move the sideslopes to the endpoints of the bottom on each side. (use your OSNAPs). vi. Escape when you are done. IMPORTANT NOTE Any time you create a channel template you can save it as a Block to be used in later projects. Type WBLOCK, pick the channel assembly and save it with your other block drawings. Use DDINSERT to pull into any future drawing. h. In the menu Corridors, pick Create Corridor. i. When the Command line asks you to Select a baseline alignment a. Right-click to get a list of your defined alignments. b. Pick the appropriate one. ii. The Command line asks you to Select a profile a. Right-click to get a list of the profiles you created. b. Pick the one you assigned designated to be Finished Ground or your planned waterway bottom. iii. The Command line asks you to Select an assembly a. Right-click to get a list of the assemblies you created. b. Pick your choice (10 ww). i. You get a large dialog box, labeled Create Corridor. i. Chose a corridor name consistent with the rest of your process name, (i. e. 10 ). ii. You will see several columns in this dialog box. You can edit all of them to get your channel to do what you want: a. You can change the beginning and ending station of the work. b. You can set the frequency of sampling, (25 is default).
j. YOU MUST SET THE TARGET COLUMN OR THIS WON T WORK. i. In the Target column, pick the little box with the 3 dots. ii. You ll get another dialog box marked Target Mapping. You ll see 3 categories of targets. The first category is Surfaces. i. Pick the row marked Object Name. ii. Pick your existing ground (EG) surface as your target surface. This will daylight your sideslopes properly. iii. The second category is Alignments. i. Pick the proper alignment. ii. If you only have one alignment you won t get an option. iv. The third category is Profiles. i. If you only have one profile you won t get an option. ii. Pick the profile that depicts your Finished Ground. v. Hit OK. The Target Mapping box will close out. 9 k. Hit OK again to close out the Corridor dialog box. i. Things will flash, and data will appear, and the Event Viewer will annoyingly show a lot of events. Close it out. ii. If you look on your plan view, you now have a waterway built and daylighted.
OTHER PROFILE OPTIONS 10 Importing an Existing Assembly: a. Open a drawing with an existing Assembly a. Sweep across it b. Right-Click ----Copy b. Get back in to your active drawing a. Right-Click-----Paste. c. The Assembly is imported and an option to built with. Creating a Surface from a Corridor: You ve got a successful corridor (waterway). You want to create a surface to calculate cut and fill. The easiest way I ve found so far: a. In the menu Corridors, pick Utilities, Polyline From Corridor b. Pick the edges of the bottom and the daylight lines of the constructed waterway. This will create 3D polylines from those features. i. When you pick the edges of the bottom, a dialog window will open and you ll be faced with alternative feature lines to choose. Always pick the ETW line. It represents the finished grade. (The other line describes the subgrade of the road.)
c. At this point, you can freeze the corridor; you ll be left with the 3D lines you just created. 11 d. Sometimes at bends or corners in the channel the polylines are confused. At this time you can take the Dipsey-doodles out of the channel by grabbing the breaklines at the grips and stretching them to the adjacent node. e. You can now create a new surface and designate the polylines as breaklines to build your surface. If you need help building a surface refer to the New Drawing and Creating a Surface help sheet. Creating Layout Points from a Corridor: A. In the menu Corridors, pick Utilities, COGO Points From Corridor i. You will be prompted, at the Command Line, to select a Corridor. i. Right Click and select from the list. ii. You ll get a dialog box labeled. Export COGO points i. You can associate layout points to the whole profile, or a reach of your choosing. ii. You ll need to name the point group that the points will be placed in. (i.e. WW). iii. The last thing is to limit the point descriptions used to: Crown, (CL); ETW, (Edge of Bottom); or P2 (Daylight lines). Note: If you are intending to use the points for staking out the channel, you only need the Crown, (CL). If you intend to use the points to create a surface, you might want to use all 3 descriptions. 1. Uncheck the rest. 2. You do not want any subgrade points to describe your channel. iii. Hit OK. iv. You now have all the layout points you ll ever need to lay out or stake the channel.