Best way to move a CAD background and all ducting/piping associated with it

[alfredo.aceves1]

Hello,

I had individual building CAD backgrounds that were aligned with an overall CAD background plan. The individual building background was moved, misaligning it from the overall background. I drew all the piping for the now misaligned background already. What's the best way to move all of the piping and the background simultaneously so that I can realign with the overall background? My one solution is to use the tab key to select all of the piping then use the ctrl key to multi-select and select the background. Although this is a bit of an issue because there are some areas where the piping isn't fully connected but just overlapping. Is there a better way to do something like this?

[hmunsell]

couple questions.... 

• Are you referring to DWG CAD files, or are you just using CAD as a general term?
• How was everything linked together?
  • Project Base Point, Shared Coordinates, etc...
• Is the project Geolocated using true Northing and Easting coordinates.

have you looked into the Relocate Project tool?

[iainsavage]

If you're only talking about part of the model being out of alignment, rather than the whole model being in the wrong place, then I think you'll just have to persevere with selecting everything on that one floor and moving it.

One possibly way to help is to create a 3D view with a section box that encompasses just the one floor - you can right click on the view cube and select "Orient to view" and pick a relevant view to speedup section box creation.

Once you've got it fixed pin your floor plans to prevent them from being accidentally moved in future.

[iainsavage]

....or maybe you could use Dynamo to select everything with coordinates in a certain range or elevations between certain limits but to be honest I don't know if, or how, that could be done.

[RLY_15]

If we're just talking a translation (moving X/Y), a windowed select of the misaligned building area in a 3D view and a move command should be enough, unless there's piping between buildings that needs to be adjusted to make the move happen. If there are other trades in the model doing this separately for some reason, use V/G overrides to reduce the view down to just your components (ducts,pipes, attached equipment)

If we're talking translation and rotation, you'll want to move based on a reference point in the building, followed by a rotation command using the same reference point as the center.

There's potential benefits in the future to have models for each building - you can link the building models into a site model and handle all of the rotation/translation on a building basis instead of a 'select everything inside the building' basis.

[dbutts7]

Put it all in a group and move it - then ungroup. Do this from a 3D view when creating the group.

Tab select is great for selecting systems and connected devices, but the 3D view based on a section is great idea as well.

thanks - David B.