AutoCAD Map 3D Forum
Welcome to Autodesk’s AutoCAD Map 3D Forums. Share your knowledge, ask questions, and explore popular AutoCAD Map 3D topics.
cancel
Showing results for 
Show  only  | Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Bringing old cadded (non-spatial) as-built documents into AutoCAD Map 3D?

9 REPLIES 9
Reply
Message 1 of 10
david.augspurger
414 Views, 9 Replies

Bringing old cadded (non-spatial) as-built documents into AutoCAD Map 3D?

I am using a trial copy of Map 3D to see if this is possible. I have a very large quantity of as-built documents created in AutoCAD. These are typically not to scale (at least not consistently) and were not created in any spatial environment. Basically, they are line drawings of roads, utilities, and reference objects (poles, fences, mail boxes, etc.). An example is attached.

Can this type of DWG be 'geo referenced' in order to give it spatial properties. I also have ArcInfo and a tremendous amount of GIS data. Ideally, I'd like to attach the old DWG as-builts to the shapefile data and/or vice versa. Sorry, the terminology eludes me 😉

Any advice wou
9 REPLIES 9
Message 2 of 10
Anonymous
in reply to: david.augspurger

Yes you can. Look at the transform command. Once you move geo-ref the
objects make sure you assign a coordinate system to that dwg.

--

Murph
http://map3d.wordpress.com/


wrote in message
news:6296693@discussion.autodesk.com...
I am using a trial copy of Map 3D to see if this is possible. I have a very
large quantity of as-built documents created in AutoCAD. These are
typically not to scale (at least not consistently) and were not created in
any spatial environment. Basically, they are line drawings of roads,
utilities, and reference objects (poles, fences, mail boxes, etc.). An
example is attached.

Can this type of DWG be 'geo referenced' in order to give it spatial
properties. I also have ArcInfo and a tremendous amount of GIS data.
Ideally, I'd like to attach the old DWG as-builts to the shapefile data
and/or vice versa. Sorry, the terminology eludes me 😉

Any advice wou
Message 3 of 10

Ok, thanks for the quick response....I'll give it a shot and report back with my results (and probably questions!)
Message 4 of 10

Murph,

I've played around with the transform function and am having some difficulty. I'm getting confused by what I should be editing and in what manner (what is the source, eg).

Assuming I want to give a DWG file some spatial awareness using existing GIS SHP files...

Do I create a new drawing and 'connect' to the GIS data, then 'attach' the DWG file or...
Do I open the DWG file and 'connect' to the GIS data or...
other?


I have taken an example DWG file that is not spatial and cleaned it up by removing extraneous information and then scaling it to 1:1. This file includes layers for road centerlines, edge of roads, our fiber utility location, various reference data (poles, fences, etc.), dimensions, and text.

I have a GIS shapefile that includes road centerlines and another shapefile our our fiber utility. I am using these as my spatial basis.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Sorry if I sound stupid 🙂 the whole spatial projections and whatnot get my head spinning!
Message 5 of 10
Anonymous
in reply to: david.augspurger

The source is the data or objects that you want to move (Transform) the
target is the location you want it to move to.

My suggestion would be to open the dwg that has your objects/layers etc in,
set the coordinate system to NULL or "" if you already tried to assign a
coordinate system to it. Then using the Data connect connect to the GIS shp
file(s). Hopefully there is a projection file with it (.prj) Add that data
to the map and it will assign the same coordinate system to your dwg. Then
indentify two know points in your dwg objects that are in the GIS objects
for example the intersection of two road centerlines, the property corner of
the Mall or what ever you have to work with. Then using the Transform
command pick the point in the dwg as the 1st source point, then the point in
the GIS data as the target/designation point, do the same for point 2. This
should move scale rotate your dwg as needed to line up with the GIS data.
Once it does disconnect from the GIS files and delete the connection. Save
your dwg with the saveas command and rename it to something else. (example
MyMap_TN83F would be mymap in TN state plane feet coordinates.

--

Murph
http://map3d.wordpress.com/


wrote in message
news:6298010@discussion.autodesk.com...
Murph,

I've played around with the transform function and am having some
difficulty. I'm getting confused by what I should be editing and in what
manner (what is the source, eg).

Assuming I want to give a DWG file some spatial awareness using existing GIS
SHP files...

Do I create a new drawing and 'connect' to the GIS data, then 'attach' the
DWG file or...
Do I open the DWG file and 'connect' to the GIS data or...
other?


I have taken an example DWG file that is not spatial and cleaned it up by
removing extraneous information and then scaling it to 1:1. This file
includes layers for road centerlines, edge of roads, our fiber utility
location, various reference data (poles, fences, etc.), dimensions, and
text.

I have a GIS shapefile that includes road centerlines and another shapefile
our our fiber utility. I am using these as my spatial basis.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Sorry if I sound stupid 🙂 the
whole spatial projections and whatnot get my head spinning!
Message 6 of 10

Murph,

Thanks for the help. Following your directions I was able to rotate and scale (transform) a sample DWG against a backdrop of gis data (road centerlines). Now that I better understand how to do it, I can see there is a lot of other things to tidy up (dimension scale, etc.). However, the basic process worked. The biggest problem I face is that the cad drawings are very generalized and are not drawn to any consistent scale. It may take a fair amount of working with the native cad drawings to prepare them for this process but it may be worth it in the end.

AfterI transformed the drawing I saved it with it's spatial projection to a new name indicating it's projection (as you suggested). I opened a blank GIS drawing in ArcMap and loaded the same shapefile I used for the road centerlines in the transformation process. I then added the newly transformed cad dwg but it doesn't draw. I opened it in Autocad and it looks fine. When I try to look at it in ArcCatalog it's blank. Not sure why but I'll investigate further.

Thanks again for the tips, hopefully with some practice I'll start to figure this out 🙂
Message 7 of 10
Anonymous
in reply to: david.augspurger

ESRI can not read the 2010 version of the DWG if I recall. Try saving the
dwg out to 2007 version.

--

Murph
http://map3d.wordpress.com/


wrote in message
news:6298253@discussion.autodesk.com...
Murph,

Thanks for the help. Following your directions I was able to rotate and
scale (transform) a sample DWG against a backdrop of gis data (road
centerlines). Now that I better understand how to do it, I can see there is
a lot of other things to tidy up (dimension scale, etc.). However, the
basic process worked. The biggest problem I face is that the cad drawings
are very generalized and are not drawn to any consistent scale. It may take
a fair amount of working with the native cad drawings to prepare them for
this process but it may be worth it in the end.

AfterI transformed the drawing I saved it with it's spatial projection to a
new name indicating it's projection (as you suggested). I opened a blank
GIS drawing in ArcMap and loaded the same shapefile I used for the road
centerlines in the transformation process. I then added the newly
transformed cad dwg but it doesn't draw. I opened it in Autocad and it
looks fine. When I try to look at it in ArcCatalog it's blank. Not sure
why but I'll investigate further.

Thanks again for the tips, hopefully with some practice I'll start to figure
this out 🙂
Message 8 of 10

Thanks, saving it back to 2007 did the trick. The text on the dwg file (within ArcMap) is enormous and I don't see any way to manipulate it. I'll play around some more and maybe figure it out. Again, thanks for the help.
Message 9 of 10
Anonymous
in reply to: david.augspurger

If you are going to be using the files and data in ESRI ArcMap I would
recommend that once you have the drawing georeferanced is use the mapexport
tools to export to shp format. Then you can adjust the text and labels as
needed in ArcMap.
Just know that text and block objects are point type objects on the export
and you may need to export some of the object properties such as "string,
color, rotation, etc" with the export as attributtes,same with the
line/plines & polygon objects.

--

Murph
http://map3d.wordpress.com/


wrote in message
news:6298608@discussion.autodesk.com...
Thanks, saving it back to 2007 did the trick. The text on the dwg file
(within ArcMap) is enormous and I don't see any way to manipulate it. I'll
play around some more and maybe figure it out. Again, thanks for the help.
Message 10 of 10

Thanks again, good information. I've had some time to tinker around today and I'm getting the hang of it. Too bad the dwgs I have to work with are so generalized. Nothing lines up along the road centerlines. Considering the amount of dwgs I have it would be a massive undertaking to convert them all. I am finding some very useful features with Map 3D though and certainly it would be useful going forward. I have a good WMS source for aerial images (ortho) that I can connect to in ArcMap but can not get it to work in Map 3D. If I could make that work, I think the benefits of Map 3D would be enough to justify it. In my tinkering today, I had to snip sections of the orthos with their TFW (spatial info) and then 'connect' to those as rasters. It worked, but it would only be good for creating new drawings of fairly small sections (a few miles of road, eg).

Thanks again, Murph, you have been a tremendous help!

Can't find what you're looking for? Ask the community or share your knowledge.

Post to forums  

Autodesk Design & Make Report

”Boost