Surface

[tonykhoury]

Hi all,
I created a surface 200' by 200'. I need to place a mesh on top of it, the mesh is made of 5'x5' blocks, 1600 blocks, then i need to show the average elevation of each block. 
Does anyone know a good way to do it ?

My first thought was to write a surface spot elevation expression, but i coudnt do it. 

Please let me know if you have an easy way to do it. 

[odoshi]

Would this Labeling command help?

[neilyj666]

When you say average elevation presumably you mean the average of the four vertices of each block?

[tonykhoury]

ODOSHI, 
Please see the attached image. I would like to display the average elevation inside each square on the grid thats all. Is it possible to do it inside civil 3d using a label command ? or any other techniques ?

Tony

[tonykhoury]

Neilyj,
Please see the attached image. I would like to display the average elevation inside each square on the grid thats all. Is it possible to do it inside civil 3d using a label command ? or any other techniques ?

Tony

[neilyj666]

I'm trying to establish what you mean by average elevation? For each square cell, do you need to take the elevation value of each vertex, sum them and divide by 4 to get a mathematical average or do you just need to show the TIN elevation in the centre.

If the former then I don't think it is possible with a lot of additional work and if the latter then odoshi's suggestion should do what you need if you pick a suitable base point

[odoshi]

OK - now I get it. Short answer, no. Unless you make a million little surfaces.

Sounds like a good idea for a custom app...

Regards,

[TerryDotson]

So you want to draw a rectangular mesh (SubDMesh) on top of a TinSurface, with the edges of the cells acquring the elevation from the tin, then generate a label in the center of the simple average of the four corners elevations?   For input you would expect to pick an origin and supply the number of rows/cols, width and height.

The mesh and labels does not need to be dynamic?

[TerryDotson]

It was an interesting scenario so we went ahead with it, another gizmo in the collection.

[tonykhoury]

Terry, 
I did it using two grids on a surface. One grid represent the 4 corners of each square, and the second grid represent the centers of each square. I exported all points into excel and then I wrote a program that take the points and organise them into squares, then take the average elevation of the surface in the square and give it a X, Y at the center of each square, then i had to import X,Y,Z into civil 3d. The final product is attached. 

Can you please elaborate on the gizmo you sent me ? I am not sure how does that work .

Tony, 
 

[TerryDotson]

Glad you found a way to do it with your existing tools.

Can you please elaborate on the gizmo?

We have developed AutoCAD add-ons for 30+ years and now are focusing on tools gizmos to automate Civil3D.  The Gizmo3D package is in the early stages but at our rate of production we plan to turn in into a massive (but managable) collection in short order.

We added a tool to generate an AutoCAD mesh on an existing Civil3D surface with labeling (currently only the average elevation) in the center of the cell.  While our results may not look exactly like yours, we can generate it in a couple of seconds without jumping though any hoops.

You (and others) are invited to work with the product (at no charge) while it's in development (and influence it's content).  Follow the link at the bottom of the Gizmo3D page and include your forum user name.

[tonykhoury]

Terry, 
I still cant find it . Did you make it an app ? where can i buy it from ?
Please let me know. 

[TerryDotson]

Drop me an email dotson [at] dotsoft [dot] com.