Explode Entire Drawing (On Purpose) - HELP

[Cadologist]

I have a small dilemma here, basically I am trying to explode a drawing, on purpose, let me explain.

 

I have a DEM surface (large area) where I have used LDD/C3D to create contours as polylines. Part of the process requires the entities be combined into a single block as I have to scale in one direction (not all) thus, require it to be in a block.

 

After scaling and whatever, I got it in place and I need to explode it.

 

You can NOT use the explode command, it crashes instantly, probably due to the extensive data (DEM surface contains approx. 3 million points).

 

Is there another way to explode this through possibly a LISP routine or some other form of command I am not aware of?

 

I have tried BURST, EXPLODE, Inserting the block (with the explode tagged) and although it inserts, it doesn't explode, etc. The block is not made as 'non-explodable', this is surely a CPU/COMPUTER power issue or some sort of ACAD limitation.

 

Anyone got any suggestions?

[mrbucket]

I have a small dilemma here, basically I am trying to explode a drawing, on purpose, let me explain.

 

I have a DEM surface (large area) where I have used LDD/C3D to create contours as polylines. Part of the process requires the entities be combined into a single block as I have to scale in one direction (not all) thus, require it to be in a block.

 

After scaling and whatever, I got it in place and I need to explode it.

 

You can NOT use the explode command, it crashes instantly, probably due to the extensive data (DEM surface contains approx. 3 million points).

 

Is there another way to explode this through possibly a LISP routine or some other form of command I am not aware of?

 

I have tried BURST, EXPLODE, Inserting the block (with the explode tagged) and although it inserts, it doesn't explode, etc. The block is not made as 'non-explodable', this is surely a CPU/COMPUTER power issue or some sort of ACAD limitation.

 

Anyone got any suggestions?

 

Have you tried re-associating the block properties then exploding it? I have had files that had crazy stuff attached to it that caused crashes, but once I changed the properties, no issues.

[Cadologist]

How do you re-associate block properties? Don't recall the slightest as to if I've ever done that before, which is odd since I've been doing CAD for 15+ years now. Might be misunderstanding what your getting at, let me know, thanks.

[mrbucket]

How do you re-associate block properties? Don't recall the slightest as to if I've ever done that before, which is odd since I've been doing CAD for 15+ years now. Might be misunderstanding what your getting at, let me know, thanks.

 

Well I might be implying wrong, highlight the block and use block command, rename, reset insertion point, allow exploding, etc.

[Cadologist]

Oh I know what your getting at.... just tried that, basically what happens is your making a block out of a block, so you can explode it, but then your left with a block still (doing this you will require to explode it twice, first time explodes the new block but then it's still a block from originally).

 

Yeah not sure what to do, any other ideas?!?

[mrbucket]

Oh I know what your getting at.... just tried that, basically what happens is your making a block out of a block, so you can explode it, but then your left with a block still (doing this you will require to explode it twice, first time explodes the new block but then it's still a block from originally).

 

Yeah not sure what to do, any other ideas?!?

 

Right, still no go. I know its kind of an ass backwards way to do it, but it actually has worked for me. ok......

 

Just out of curiosity, have you tried exploding before scaling? Would it be possible to pull this block aside in another drawing, scale it up, explode, then scale with basepoint back down then insert? I understand its alot of data, but maybe isolating it will help.

[Cadologist]

It comes out off LDD/C3D exploded already, it's a massive contour drawing. I had to make it into a 'block' so I could stretch it in the 'Y' by a factor of 2, just how it comes in, then manually align it up to a satellite image (just for planning purposes).

 

There isn't a way I know of that you can highlight all the entities and scale them up only in one direction. Making it into a block then changing the 'Y' is the way I've already dealt with stretching in this fashion.

 

So no, basically I am stuck with the block, would prefer it exploded for ease of working with the contour lines rather then it being a single block. Before combining them originally, there are approximately 7500 polylines.

[mrbucket]

It comes out off LDD/C3D exploded already, it's a massive contour drawing. I had to make it into a 'block' so I could stretch it in the 'Y' by a factor of 2, just how it comes in, then manually align it up to a satellite image (just for planning purposes).

 

There isn't a way I know of that you can highlight all the entities and scale them up only in one direction. Making it into a block then changing the 'Y' is the way I've already dealt with stretching in this fashion.

 

So no, basically I am stuck with the block, would prefer it exploded for ease of working with the contour lines rather then it being a single block. Before combining them originally, there are approximately 7500 polylines.

 

Ahhhh, gotcha. Would it be possible with a better pc and much more memory? You mentioned that your pc is the bottleneck in the command.

[Cadologist]

I am guessing it's the PC but honestly the machine I have is decent enough, I think it may be just an AutoCAD limitation.

 

Oh, just to add, I can probably take 'chunks' of the original pre-block drawing of the contours and scale them in the 'Y' then keep doing that but what a PITA, plus alot of wasted time setting up some sort of reference grid or whatever.

[LEsq]

I am guessing it's the PC but honestly the machine I have is decent enough, I think it may be just an AutoCAD limitation.

 

Oh, just to add, I can probably take 'chunks' of the original pre-block drawing of the contours and scale them in the 'Y' then keep doing that but what a PITA, plus alot of wasted time setting up some sort of reference grid or whatever.

 

I wrote something named SuperBurst in C# but it is focus to blocks, if I had a chance, might be able to give it a try to do a super explode or something like that also in ARX, but no promises at all.

 

Upload the sample drawing if you can, and once I get a chance will run a test.

[Cadologist]

I can't upload it, it's well over 20mb..... it's huge. I'm going to start searching the forums a bit more here, did take a look earlier but nothing really came out that would work or related to what I am trying to accomplish.

 

Ideally, I wish I could just bring them into the project directly but there's multiple coordinate issues on it, convert from lat/long to NAD83 Zone 12 then convert the entire thing to our local coordinate system, and even still something is screwed.

 

Need more coffee......

[rkent]

For a block named ROCK. Use -INSERT (note the dash - in front of insert) command, type *rock, ...

The block will be inserted exploded, might work for your problem.

[mrbucket]

For a block named ROCK. Use -INSERT (note the dash - in front of insert) command, type *rock, ...

The block will be inserted exploded, might work for your problem.

 

ahh- Nice! That might work. Its amazing what you forget when you dont use something for a few years. I love this place.

[LEsq]

I can't upload it, it's well over 20mb..... it's huge. I'm going to start searching the forums a bit more here, did take a look earlier but nothing really came out that would work or related to what I am trying to accomplish.

 

Ideally, I wish I could just bring them into the project directly but there's multiple coordinate issues on it, convert from lat/long to NAD83 Zone 12 then convert the entire thing to our local coordinate system, and even still something is screwed.

 

Need more coffee......

 

I see... if you want make an small size by saving just a partial area of your drawing, and upload that... don't know it might help to understand better the problem or to others to give a try too.

[David Bethel]

You might also be able to ( entmake ) the BLOCK table entities without the block header or endblk entities. This might also allow you to strip off any xdata or skip say proxy entities that can be causing problems. -David

[Cadologist]

Did some research on this..... for reference I started another thread.

 

http://www.cadtutor.net/forum/showthread.php?t=43266

 

Alot of threads and other information locations state, you can 'NOT' explode a non-uniformly scaled block. I just tried it with a simple rectangle and it worked, but with my massive DEM contour region (ie: 7500 polylines in the block), nope, direct to crash.