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SHARING CIVIL 3D FILES with NONCIVIL3D CAD USERS


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When I send other CAD Users (nonCivil3D) my CAD Files (using E-Transmit), they say that my Surfaces, Contours,Contours labels,etc... are not Visible.

 

I tried E-Transmit in version ACAD2000, but that didnt help...

 

I finally had to explode everything and reLabel my Contours "by hand", and that way, they are abale to utilize the data....

 

Is there an easier way ? :?

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Be sure you turn on visibility for everything you want them to have before exporting (eg. surface tin, points (frozen or non-display style), pipe label/information, etc.).

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moz-screenshot.pngI am having a similar problem, exporting my drawings. On Civil 3D, all of my line work has been created using featurelines. When I try to export to AutoCAD 2000, all curved faces are coming out faceted. We've tried .dxf, exploding all feature lines, first, and I am still having issues transmitting a clear image of what I have drawn. Any thoughts?
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That happens because the Feature Lines get converted into 3D Polylines, which can have only straight segments.

 

The only solution I know of at this point for that problem is the Extract2D command in the Sincpac-C3D, which can extract a flattened polyline from Feature Lines. This only gives you a 2D polyline flattened to Z=0, but it maintains true curves.

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  • 11 months later...

I may be resurrecting an old thread, but this question deserves a better answer.

  • Civil 3D (as well as LDD and other verticals) often create "objects" which are more than just AutoCAD entities.
  • To See these objects in AutoCAD without the application that created them requires "object enablers"
  • Object enablers are generally free to download, install and use.
  • The graphics displayed by object enablers are not usually saved in the file.
  • To create graphics visible without the original application or object enablers, the variables PROXYGRAPHICS and PROXYSHOW can be set to 1. This will also save the graphics to the file (increasing file sizes.)

The graphics can be exploded, but they will lose intelligence and sometimes other attributes - like having arcs stroked to polylines.

In most cases, if you are using the prospector with styles to display information and graphics of your design, you are using objects and the people that you send files to will need the enablers or you need to display proxy graphics.

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Object Enablers only help if the other person is on the same or newer version, as compared to the version of C3D used to create the drawing. They won't help someone with Autocad 2000 use a C3D file.

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True, but hopefully, if you are all working on a single project, you all have the same version. Otherwise, you need to work these things out.

But it seemed clear from the initial post, that many users are completely unaware that these objects are even an issue. Everywhere I have ever worked, only a small numbers of people knew that these applications wrote things to the file that were not visible without the application that created them, or what steps might be required to rectify the situation.

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