topic Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation in Fabrication CADmep Forum

Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Sep 2016 18:10:13 GMT

Is there a way to wholesale lengthen/shorten all the vertical pipe on a drawing to a common elevation? we have thousands of risers.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Sep 2016 19:11:16 GMT

Currently what I do is:

Isolate by system, then size

Isolate riser pipe only

Reverse Design line

Explode Designline

AutoCAD line extend in front view to desired elevation

Designline trace (applied to the correct service)

Fill pipe

Delete Design line

whew... rinse repeat... i am looking for something more automated.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 05:32:19 GMT

I don't think this is exactly what you are looking for, but I think it would be a lot simpler processes than what you are doing.

If you've ever sliced a 3D solid, there is a command in Fabrication (SLT) that does something very similar. You should be able to draw a (line) cutting plane that crosses the pipe you want to chop off. Run SLT, select the line, right click to close selection and a dialog will pop up featuring all the relevant items crossing that plane. Depending on what kind of system you are running, this could do precisely what you want, but I assume you are using a more sophisticated service than PExPE connections. So, on a copper system you will see it cut the pipe and add couplings at this lines location. Maybe windowing the excess and deleting it is close enough for what your doing?

An alternative (more precise method) is to add a zero thickness joint into your services that allow a PExPE connection and give it a specific button code that you can target with the SLT dialog, but I am not fond of that idea.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

AHepker_HOB — Tue, 18 Oct 2016 12:45:52 GMT

The command referred to above is SLICETOOL. It allows you to cut in any part in your service that has a button code. Works relatively well for other instances as well, such as cutting in couplings or valves on multiple services.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

AHepker_HOB — Tue, 18 Oct 2016 18:52:39 GMT

Just to clarify my previous post, the SLICETOOL command only works in the XY plane. I have tried rotating the UCS in an elevation view and it did not work. It only works in a top view.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Tue, 21 Nov 2017 17:41:25 GMT

Hi TQ1918,

I am a year too late, but maybe this will help future people.

I did not create this lsp file, but I did edit it from an all thread rod lsp to pipe elevation lsp. So with this lsp file, it asks me for the desired elevation of the top of pipe in inches and then it does its magic to lengthen or shorten the pipe to the desired height. However, it does not work for the bottom of pipe. The command is "PTop".

(defun c:PTop (/ scr fil ss inc)
(setq scr (strcat (getvar "Logfilepath") "tmp.cod")
inc (getreal "Specify desired elevation for top of pipe in inches:")
ss (mapfilter "#39=2041" 0 0 1)
fil (open scr "w"))
(write-line "If item.CID = 2041 Then" fil)
(write-line "dim dia = item.endlocation(1, \"top\") - item.endlocation(1, \"z\")" fil)
(write-line "dim ton = item.endlocation(1, \"z\") + item.dim[\"Length\"].numvalue - dia" fil)
(write-line (strcat "dim uel = " (vl-princ-to-string inc)) fil)
(write-line "dim cel = ton" fil)
(write-line "dim nel = uel - cel" fil)
(write-line "item.dim[\"Length\"].value = item.dim[\"Length\"].numvalue + nel" fil)
(write-line "if item.dim[\"Length\"].value < 0.0 then" fil)
(write-line "item.dim[\"Length\"].value = 0" fil)
(write-line "endif endif" fil)
(close fil)
(executescript scr ss)
(command ".redraw")
(princ)
)

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Tue, 21 Nov 2017 23:52:23 GMT

If they were drawn in design line, one could:

1. Unfill the design line

2. Node edit, and select the end nodes you wanted

3. Pick an elevation for the end node

You could do this for both the top and bottom of the pipe.

4. Refill

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Mon, 27 Nov 2017 13:32:54 GMT

Joey,

This was exactly what I was looking for.

I gave this no tweaks. Must be in and "elevation view" for this to work.

Give the top elevation in inches and boom! Magic.

This code is worth 1000's of dollars.

-Thank you

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Mon, 27 Nov 2017 16:14:09 GMT

hmmm ran into a snag only the C2 stretches. if C2 is down C2 pipe end stretches down to the floor instead of the deck. Now i need a script that swaps pipe ends from c1 to c2.

Re: Lengthen/stretch pipe to elevation

Anonymous — Mon, 27 Nov 2017 17:47:39 GMT

It’s still a work in progress. I have a xtracad post about editing the script to make it work better.

http://www.xtracad.com/forum/index.php?topic=14932.new;topicseen#new