Streamlining Cut & Fill Processes – Any Tips or Tools?

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

Hi all,

This is more out of curiosity than anything serious, but while working on a cut and fill exercise for my engineering role, I found myself wondering—does anyone have a quicker or more efficient way of doing this? Or perhaps there are some LISP routines out there that could help streamline the process?

I work for a commercial housing engineering company, and we do a lot of cut and fill work. My usual workflow involves tracing around each house block with a 3D polyline, offsetting it inward by 0.5mm to generate a 3D FFL polyline, then repeating the process for each back garden, retaining wall, driveway, etc. Once that’s done, I go over everything and assign Z levels.

I’m curious if anyone here has developed a better workflow, uses helpful tools, or knows of any LISP routines that could speed things up. Would love to hear how others approach this!

Thanks in advance.

[DGCSCAD]

Search for "Lee Mac Outline Objects", which could help in your initial tracing, but the current version doesn't generate a 3D Poly, if that's what you need.

Things to consider, based on needing output to be a 3D Poly:

• Modify Lee Macs Outline Objects LISP to generate a 3D Poly
• Keep LM's code as-is and find a LISP function that turns a LW Poly into a 3D Poly, then apply that to the LW Poly.
• The offset could be coded as well.

[john.uhden]

@Sidney_Barrett-redford ,

Civil 3D.

[Sea-Haven]

In my past this exact task was requested, it was for concrete house slabs, a few factors creep in like a slab that has multi levels. The developer wanted to limit cut whenever possible as that is pay for dirt to be removed.

Like @john.uhden there is grading tools in CIV3D, so can work out volumes between surfaces. It is also a function of Civil Site Design, which runs on top of CIV3D or Bricscad Pro.

Just a remark, when Autodesk like 20 years ago showed how to raise or lower a house type surface, my comment to the Autodesk rep was as an ex alternative software rep. That software that was like 10 years old at that time,  had the option cut=fill and would auto adjust, compared to running the house surface at different levels manually and looking at cut/fill report.

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

Thanks for this ill look into it today and see if there's anyways to modify it to suit my needs closer. 

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

Ill take a look into Civil3D and see if this is any easier for me, thanks for this. 

[Sea-Haven]

If you google "Civil Site Design" there are webinars showing how to do pad style designs. Here is one Webcast | Lot Grading

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

Thanks for your help it's much appreciated!!!

[autoid374ceb4990]

Sidney_Barrett-redford:

What type of data do you use for the base grade and final grade elevations - contour map, survey data, Lidar data ?? I did not completely understand how you calculated volumes. Most of the cut/fill calculations I am familiar with now use some sort of mesh for the base grade and final grade to calculate cut/fill quantities. 

[Sea-Haven]

@autoid374ceb4990 taking a house slab as an example you make a surface model of the base of the slab including ribs. Wont go into now but ribs need to be done slightly off vertical. The edges have a batter or vertical edge set to them. Then in most CIVIL software a comparison of the two surface s is carried out to get a volume. You can also do cross sections showing existing surface and proposed surface. Making the new house slab surface model is not a 5 minute job.

[autoid374ceb4990]

Yes, I understand the procedure.  In fact I wrote programs way back in R14 to do just that, define a pad with side slopes and calculate volumes with respect to a TIN that defined the existing grade.  I was just wondering how the original poster calculated his volumes.

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

The volumes are calculated on Site3D once the levels are exported from AutoCAD. It then compares the original levels to the new levels and outputs volumes. 

[Sea-Haven]

 I would guess your in England, using Site3D, have a client who uses it. Does it not have a grading module similar to the ponds option ? If you go the Civ3D or Civil Site Design  then you may not need to go to Site3D. I have dealt with the people at CSD and you could email them asking for some help about how to do your task using their software. let me know if you have a problem contacting.

[Sidney_Barrett-redford]

I'm based in the UK and have been looking into using Civil 3D more in my workflow—it definitely seems like a more efficient way to handle the kind of work I do. Setting up templates and getting everything configured properly is on my to-do list, and while there's a bit of a learning curve, I'm keen to get to grips with it. Should be worth it in the long run.