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

Trouble with coordinates on manually added points.

16 REPLIES 16
Reply
Message 1 of 17
kris_cheeseman
1653 Views, 16 Replies

Trouble with coordinates on manually added points.

OK, to start with I am fairly new to Civil 3D.  I have a drawing I want to add points for export to RTK for stakeout.  When I open the drawing it appears to be coordinated to the proper projection according to control monuments in the area.  The cursor coordinates are correct when I pan around the drawing, and points and lines slected from the original drawing display proper coordinates for the area.

 

I have manually created points in the drawing and the values on these points are way off.  I know it has something to do with the projection settings or UCS settings but I am not sure where I am going wrong.  I have tried setting the drawing to the proper projection then adding points but it still gives me insane values on them tthat make no sense to me.

 

What I would like to do is set the drawing up so I can pick a point on the screen manually and have it display the same coordinates as the original drawing so I can then export them as a .txt file to Trimble RTK.

 

I have attached the drawing, points 1-33 in the only point group were the points added by myself.

 

Any direction would be appreciated, I feel like I am on the right track but missing something fairly simple in all the menus and settings.

 

Cheers,

 

Kris

Tags (2)
16 REPLIES 16
Message 2 of 17

As far as I know the coordinate system the drawing is in is Nova Scotia ATS '77 Zone 5.  This is the coordinates the local monuments are published in and matches the X-Y values in the drawing.

 

Message 3 of 17
enpope
in reply to: kris_cheeseman

At the command line.... set your UCS to World

Message 4 of 17

OK, that was easy, now the points I create line up properly with the coordinates in the drawing.  Now how to get the exported coordinates back to the original drawing coordinates.  It seems like I need to set the zone/projection and then export them but the grid coordinates are still way off where they should be when I check the list in prospector. I'm such a noob...

Message 5 of 17
doni49
in reply to: kris_cheeseman

What do you mean by your grid


@kris_cheeseman wrote:

OK, that was easy, now the points I create line up properly with the coordinates in the drawing.  Now how to get the exported coordinates back to the original drawing coordinates.  It seems like I need to set the zone/projection and then export them but the grid coordinates are still way off where they should be when I check the list in prospector. I'm such a noob...


What do you mean?  Just that they are no longer at coordinates in nice round increments (like grid ticks in the attached screenshot)?  If that's what you mean, then they were created based on the coordinate system you were in at the time they were created and will need to be recreated now that you've brought your ucs back to world.

 

GridTick.png



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




If a reply solves your issue, please remember to click on "Accept as Solution". This will help other users looking to solve a similar issue. Thank you.


Please do not send a PM asking for assistance. That's what the forums are for. This allows everyone to benefit from the question asked and the answers given.

Message 6 of 17

I'm doing something terribly wrong or the drawing is not coordinated properly, I can't decide....

 

I turned on the control monuments.  The coordinate numbers I am getting from the original drawing are about 2000 ft. short of the published number.

 

This is a link to the published numbers for NSCM 8273 in the drawing.  This is in meters but when I convert to feet (which most of the drawing is in the numbers are close), but a couple thousand feet off.  Nothing I change in the drawing settings seems to make them match the published control numbers.

 

http://gis8.nsgc.gov.ns.ca/scripts/esrimap.dll?name=DataLocator31&cmd=0&t=4991831&b=4991141&ta=1&l=3...

 

Maybe I am in over my head here.

       

Message 7 of 17
doni49
in reply to: kris_cheeseman

I opened your drawing (or more accurately the one that enope reposted for you). 

 

You said you're working in metric but I'm seeing labels in feet and when I measure the corresponding line, the length matches the feet label.  So are you sure you're in metric?

 

Also, as best I can tell, the drawing DOES NOT have an assigned coordinate system.  Type in MAPCASSIGN -- the fields are blank.  I work in Missouri (USA) and our state is split into three separate coordinate zones.  Depending upon where a project is located within the state, we enter MO83-WF, MO83-CF or MO83-EF.  The F on the end tells it to use feet.  If I left that off, it would use metric units.

 

CoordinateZone.png



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




If a reply solves your issue, please remember to click on "Accept as Solution". This will help other users looking to solve a similar issue. Thank you.


Please do not send a PM asking for assistance. That's what the forums are for. This allows everyone to benefit from the question asked and the answers given.

Message 8 of 17
enpope
in reply to: doni49

Kris;

 

I think the problem is that the original drawing was created in a user defined UCS and not the World UCS. If you type in UCSMAN at the command line of the original drawing you will see that there are two UCS systems available, the one called  “Unnamed” is current. In Civil 3D any Cogo Points that you insert from a file or create manually always revert to the World UCS.  You need to set the Current UCS to World then translate everything in the drawing to the correct coordinates based on the published control coordinates.  

 

Take a look at the attached drawing and see if the coordinates are more in line with what you are looking for.

 

Neal

Message 9 of 17
kris_cheeseman
in reply to: enpope

The drawing is in feet yes.  Our local monuments are published in meters.  I cannot open your drawings as I am working in Civil 3D 2011.  Sounds like you are on the right track enope but when I try and open your drawing it says created with a newer version of Autocad. 

 

What I am needing to do, is take this drawing and stake out points that I have created in the drawing.  I created them and exported them to a .txt file but the coordinates in the .txt files show as world UCS (as in 80-90 million feet east and north instead of 16-18 million feet east and north which is in line with the local ATS '77 coordinate value I am looking for.

 

So if I am correct I need to do a shift or translation of some sort to get the coordinates of the NSCM's in the drawing to line up with the unamed UCS where it seems off a couple thousand feet, then switch to WCS and create my points.  But how do I get my created points exported coordinate values to be in the same (ish) system as the original drawing.  I'm not 100% sure how it was created or by what Cad program but the X and Y values of objects and points (layer 1 which is shut off in the drawing I uploaded) seem to coincide very closely with the published local values (in feet).

 

It seems like it would almost be easier to shift the whole drawing to match the WCS then create my points and export them since the .txt files I end up with when I export my created points are in WCS values.

 

I am sorry if I am completely missing something, and I thank you for your time!

 

Message 10 of 17

Wait, that last part is what you told me to do I think Neal.  I am going to try this.

 

Kris

Message 11 of 17

Nope I am still lost.  I feel so clueless.  I'm not sure how to even go about this task.

Message 12 of 17
doni49
in reply to: kris_cheeseman

Nova Scotia has several coordinate zones.  You need to figure out which one is appropriate for your site.

 

Once you have that, set your drawing's coordinate zone as appropriate.  See the screenshots below.  Then having done that, you'll probably need to rotate and translate your drawing/points to fit within the coordinates.  But take care of the first part first.

 

C3DEditCoordZone.png

 

C3DCoordZoneNSC.png



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




If a reply solves your issue, please remember to click on "Accept as Solution". This will help other users looking to solve a similar issue. Thank you.


Please do not send a PM asking for assistance. That's what the forums are for. This allows everyone to benefit from the question asked and the answers given.

Message 13 of 17
doni49
in reply to: doni49

P.S. Make sure your UCS is set to WORLD too.



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




If a reply solves your issue, please remember to click on "Accept as Solution". This will help other users looking to solve a similar issue. Thank you.


Please do not send a PM asking for assistance. That's what the forums are for. This allows everyone to benefit from the question asked and the answers given.

Message 14 of 17
enpope
in reply to: kris_cheeseman

Kris;

 

I have attached a 2011 version of  the translated drawing. The export to an older version converted the Civil Points to blocks so you may have to manualy recreate the points. FYI you do not need to worry about setting the coordinate system for the drawing. That only matters if you want Civil 3D to do point transformation on import / export. If this does not help, email me at enpope@southernco.com.

 

Neal

Message 15 of 17
doni49
in reply to: enpope


@enpope wrote:

Kris;

 

I have attached a 2011 version of  the translated drawing. The export to an older version converted the Civil Points to blocks so you may have to manualy recreate the points. FYI you do not need to worry about setting the coordinate system for the drawing. That only matters if you want Civil 3D to do point transformation on import / export. If this does not help, email me at enpope@southernco.com.

 

Neal


Kris is obviously new (not a dig as we've all been new at some point) so why teach bad habits from the start?  Drawing in the proper coordinate zone  is the best thing to do.  The ONLY way I'd do otherwise is if I didn't have proper monumentation that shows the coordinates.



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




If a reply solves your issue, please remember to click on "Accept as Solution". This will help other users looking to solve a similar issue. Thank you.


Please do not send a PM asking for assistance. That's what the forums are for. This allows everyone to benefit from the question asked and the answers given.

Message 16 of 17
kris_cheeseman
in reply to: enpope

OK Neal those points values do look a lot more like what im looking for.  How did you get everything moved to the WCS? I was going to create a point by northing and easting in WCS at the published values for the NSCM 8272 then just grab and move the whole drawing from that point.  Somehow that seems wrong but I'm not sure why.

Message 17 of 17
enpope
in reply to: doni49

Don;

 

I agree with your point. What I wanted to make sure he understood was that how the coordinate system was set has nothing to do with the problem he is having with this drawing.

 

Neal

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

Post to forums  

Rail Community


Autodesk Design & Make Report