CONTOUR ELEVATIONS

[Anonymous]

I often receive files from different firms containing exciting ground contours and design contours, some of them when I try to open the file the contours come out as rectangle shape even water lines and other underground utilities, I have Autodesk 2010 LT and Autocad civil 3D 2014, also some of the files will say it was created with a newer version of Autocad but when I ask the engineering firm they say it was created with 2013 version, can you help me please?

[AllenJessup]

Are you saying that this happens in Civil 3D. Any of the other programs would need a Civil 3D Object Enabler installed. Do you have a small drawing that exhibits the problem you can post?

[Jeew-m]

Dear besmel,

I hope this happens because of the version mismatch. You are trying to open a drawing which is created Civil 3D 2017 or later from Civil 3D 2014. 

Once they send the drawings with 2013 version, do they works as expected or still you get rectangles. 

Thanks

[Anonymous]

Actually they are using 2013

[Anonymous]

I did attach a JPG file with the post

[AllenJessup]

Yes. I looked at it. However you can't do anything with a raster file except look at it.

[rkmcswain]

I suspect your image is of a Civil 3D drawing opened in AutoCAD LT. If you don't have the object enabler installed, then AEC objects appear as rectangles. 

As to the Civil 3D version compatibilities:

• C3D 2004-2012 - drawings done in these versions must stay in these versions.
• C3D 2013-2016 - drawings are generally forwards and backwards compatible, and can be exchanged between these versions.
• C3D 2017 - drawings done in this version must stay in this version.
• C3D 2018-2019 are generally forwards and backwards compatible, and can be exchanged between these versions.
• Above and beyond that, any C3D drawing can be opened in a NEWER version than what it was authored in, but it will be permanently upgraded to that version. For example, if you create a C3D drawing in C3D 2014, and open that drawing in 2017 and save it, you cannot go back to 2014, or 2015, or 2016.
• C3D version compatibility is not related to DWG file compatibility. 

[Anonymous]

here is the original file

[Anonymous]

The image was taken from DWG true view 2018

[AllenJessup]

Opening the drawing in Civil 3D 2019 shows no squares other than one polyline.

This suggests that while the drawing format may have been in 2013. The Civil 3D objects are from a newer format. The AutoCAD 2013 drawing format stayed until 2018. So the drawing could have come from 2014-2017 and still be in the 2013 format. But the Civil 3D objects would be newer.

I did verify that the drawing format is 2017 (AC1027)

[Anonymous]

Any idea how can I solve the problem other than purchasing the C3D 2019?

[Anonymous]

Any Idea on how to solve the problem, excluding the purchase of C3D 2019?

Thanks,

[AllenJessup]

You need to have the creator of the file send you a drawing with all the Civil 3D objects stripped out. Then send you an XML file with the Civil objects. You then import the XML file. This isn't perfect. But it's the closest you can get with backwards compatibility.

[rkmcswain]

An upgrade to the earlier textual C3D compatibility chart.