¿Is possible to change the color (112) in the pipe insulation in AutoCAD Plant 3D 2022?

[rhav.cadmanager]

Hello!!

Someone know if is possible to change the color (112) in the pipe insulation?

The color in the insulation layer is BYLAYER, so Plant3D to put by default the 112 color with 70% of transparency into the layer "*_insulation" . 

Plant3D 2022.1

thanks, 

@rhav.cadmanager 
Topic Title has been changed for better findability by @joaquim.moral Original Post: Insulation Color

[h_eger]

I do not know that the color and transparency of the insulation are adjustable. Except afterwards via the Layer Manager

[jw7018]

The insulation acquires the line number as a prefix for the layer name so editing a template DWT layer may not work.

This could work for supports:

[rhav.cadmanager]

Hello, any idea about this?

Autodesk can say something?, any response?

I undestand that this option is available from 2021 and work fine, but in this new version 2022 is horrible. In my company we put the color by Specs, so I need that the color of insulation be the same color of Specs and now this it's impossible, because the color of insulation ever is in color 112 (see first image)
Thanks for any response about this.

[breznovsky]

Hello, 

any useful solution?
I'm not even surprised that Autodesk will change anything without being able to edit it somewhere. Transitions to other versions are just a burden and we always stop at such nonsense.

Thanks for any advice. I'm desperate.

[EricNyh]

Subscribing to this thread.

[Michiel.Valcke]

It's not a lot better than editing the layer list afterwards, but if the correct layer already exists in your drawing, adding isolation will not overwrite it. So if you know your linenumbers beforehand you can create your layers "linenumber"_Insulation beforehand, so when you design your lines and add insulation they will take the color and transparancy of the already existing layer.

You could use a script/lisp to read layer information from an excel or txt file and create the layers for you after creating your drawing. Or one that sets it afterwards. (and can maybe just look up any layer with a _insulation suffix)

It's not a great solution, but in lieu of something better, there's this 🙂

Other than that, you can make an idea in the P3D section, link it here and we'll all vote for it probably.

[20034202]

@rhav.cadmanager by layer

[rajendra.prajapat]

@rhav.cadmanager 

you can manage it by insulation layer.

[rhav.cadmanager]

Hello everyone,

@Michiel.Valckether are many ways for to solvey this. vlisp, vbasic, .Net, etc. but, we never have a list of lines, many times the Pipe Designer have to make a line number, so when update the Navisworks Manager the insulation appears in color 112 and without transparency.

@20034202and @rajendra.prajapat  if it's so easy, i don't make this question. I kown the Plant3D make a Layer with the suffix text _insulation. But you need to know the color and every time you make a new line, you need to change the color if this have Insulation.

I explain before in other post, in my company we working with the colours by "Service" and the name of layer by "Line Number"

All the ways on your comments are able, but they are not efficient, there are slow proces and it depends  on the user.

I don't undestand why if something working well, @Anonymous change it and impose a color (112) without giving the possibility to change it.

My finally solution is change it in Navisworks Manage with "Appearance Profiler". I Change the transparency and the color (9) to all Layer that contains the word "Insulation"

I don't like this solution but for my is the best solution, quickly and easy for the Pipe Designer.

Plant3D born to help to user, no for that the user help them.

Thanks everyone.

[jw7018]

Nice work around with Navis.

Can you post a screen shot of your config of your "Appearance Profiler"  filled out ? 

[rhav.cadmanager]

Of course,

-First i make a filter with "Find Items" Box, with these parametres. This filter select all elements that contains the word "Insulation" (be careful with uppercase and lowercase letters)
This filter working with models from Plant3D, because it look in the name of the layer.
If you need add other filter from other app, it's necessary to add other filter with the correct parameter in Category and Property.

-Second you need to save the search into "Sets" Box. This way every time that i update the models (ifc, dwg, rvt, nwc, etc),

-Third, You have to create the configuration with these parameters into "Appearance Profiler" and Run.

you need to set color and transparency and Add.

and finally, ever time that you do need to update your models, only do you need apply this rule.

fast and easy.

I hope this help you.

Regards.

[dracona.fachse]

Hi folks, 

since there were no changes made to this in Version 2023 we switched back to the old view style using PLANTINSULATIONUSEPARTLAYER -> ON. (Which also brings back the proper insulation color to Navisworks)

When it comes to Orthos this "feature" grows more to an issue - especially if you want pipeline colors to be dependent on some attributes (like in our case pipeline service).

1. Insulation layer style is propagated from a standard (and hidden somewhere) definition.
2. Insulation layer behaviour cannot be trimmed like in 3D-DWG

So insulation is either mashing up the clarity of the drawing (since insulation color is mixing with service colors of the pipelines) or you cannot see service colors at all.

Thus including insulation in an orthographic view means much more workaround for us in any way as the insulation layer color (viewport and pipeline specific) needs to be adapted every time a new viewport is created or new lines appear on refresh:

1. Create Ortho view with hidden line insulation
2. edit insulation layer color to neutral (ACI 9 + dashed linetype for instance)
3. switch inside viewport for refresh to make changes appear at ortho block objects (which include insulation lines)

Pretty annoying for an improvement...

Is there some coding genius reading this, who might help us out with a little LISP that automates this prior to CTRL+P?

Regards

[jabowabo]

I'm not much for writing LISP but here's a .NET method that changes the insulation layers colors to match piping objects. Maybe you can use it for reference.

public static void SetInsulationLayerColors()
{
	Database db = Active.Db;

	List<string> processedLayers = new List<string>();
	string pipLayName;
	string insulLayName;
	short aci;

	// iterate all p3d pipe & fittings
	// select piping and fittings objects
	List<string> startCodes = new List<string>();
	startCodes.Add("ACPPPIPE");
	startCodes.Add("ACPPPIPEINLINEASSET");
	Autodesk.AutoCAD.Internal.Utils.SetFocusToDwgView();
	var p3dIds = GetIdsTools.GetAllIdsByDxfCodes(startCodes, true);
	if (p3dIds.Count == 0) return;

	using (Transaction tr = db.TransactionManager.StartTransaction())
	{
		foreach (ObjectId id in p3dIds)
		{
			// get ent as readOnly
			Entity ent = (Entity)tr.GetObject(id, OpenMode.ForRead);

			// get layer name & color
			pipLayName = ent.Layer;
			insulLayName = $"{pipLayName}_Insulation";

			// skip if already processed insul layer
			if (processedLayers.Contains(insulLayName))
				continue;

			// if insul layer exists, change color
			if (LayerTools.DoesLayerExist(insulLayName, ref db))
			{
				aci = (short)ent.ColorIndex;
				LayerTools.SetLayerColor(insulLayName, aci);
				processedLayers.Add(insulLayName);
			}
		}

		tr.Commit();
	}// end tr
}

[h_eger]

In the future, this problem is solved. You will have to wait until 04/2023

[PSS-PDI_VNguyen]

I'm running P3D 2023 and found this command does the trick:

PLANTINSULATIONUSEPARTLAYER

turn it on and BOOM. Insulation should match the layer of the pipe.

i hope it works for 2022 as well!

thanks

[h_eger]

no in P3D the function PLANTINSULATIONUSEPARTLAYER is not integrated. This function is only available since P3D 2023.

It is finally solved with P3D 2024 with the system variable PLANTINSULATIONCOLOR.
there the following commands and system variables are available to us