How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

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3ddatapro
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How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by 3ddatapro »

I spent many hours trying to figure out how to align an .rcp with survey data in US Survey feet within Civil 3d 2017. It is a very frustrating issue and the solution involves changing units several times and scaling the point cloud. If anyone has a better solution, please comment.

How to combine Survey Data in US Survey Feet and Recap point clouds into Civil 3d 2017:
1. Export from Scene in Meters
2. Import into recap as meters, save as meters (Recap wants to default to meters)
3. In Civil 3d 2017, open a .dwg in Imperial Units.
4. Below prospector, select “settings” right click on “Drawing1” Select “Edit Drawing Settings” Change “Imperial to Metric Conversion” to US Survey Feet
5. Insert – Points from File, select .csv file in PENZD format or whichever format you need.
6. Survey data should come in. Zoom-extents to take a look.
7. Now it’s time to bring in a point cloud. Change “edit drawings settings” – Drawings Units – to Meters AND change back to “International Foot” -- This is very important!!!
8. Attach .rcp file from Recap
9. Uncheck insertion point
10. Uncheck scale – specify on screen. Enter a scale value of 0.99999803
11. Once point cloud appears in Civil 3d, change units back to Feet and conversion back to US Survey Feet.
12. Points and point cloud should now align
13. If you need to bring in other Recap point cloud files in the future, you must change units back to Meters and Imperial Foot, like step 6. After bringing in files, again change units back to Feet.


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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by 3ddatapro »

Also, a college is going to model some parts of the project in Revit. I will be delivering the final in Civil 3d with the Revit components, a 1' contour terrain, and survey data all combined. Do I need to ask my college to scale the point cloud before she begins modeling in Revit? Or will I need to scale her 3d model in Civil 3d?

Any help or advice would be appreciated, even quick messages or thoughts could get me pointed in the right direction.

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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by winslowkr »

Any update on the .99999803 scale? This is working for us but is really a pain in the but.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by JeffT »

That is the conversion factor between international feet and US Survey feet. We usually use 0.999998000004.

If your coordinates are very high, that extra decimals might make a difference.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by winslowkr »

JeffT wrote: Sat Feb 02, 2019 1:06 am That is the conversion factor between international feet and US Survey feet. We usually use 0.999998000004.

If your coordinates are very high, that extra decimals might make a difference.
That does help get it even closer, but this seems like a bandaid workaround. I hate having to explain to clients why and how to do scale a point cloud when I deliver a finished project.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by JeffT »

Scene does not do this for you? Cyclone does it automatically, but then again you can do surveying work with Cyclone so I guess that was implicit.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by TommyMaddox »

If you have SCENE you can do this quite a bit easier in SCENE and just export the pointcloud which is now transformed to survey control coordinates.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by SageRoot »

Try the UNITS command in Civil 3D. I'm not sure if this is a bug in C3D or not, but if you set the Insertion Scale to US Survey Feet things seem to work out correctly.

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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by Mike H »

SageRoot wrote:Try the UNITS command in Civil 3D. I'm not sure if this is a bug in C3D or not, but if you set the Insertion Scale to US Survey Feet things seem to work out correctly.

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This is how I do it also. Autocad will always treat .rcp files as metric. If your insertion scale is set to US feet, it will convert the point cloud correctly.
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Re: How to Align Survey Data and Recap .rcp in Civil 3d 2017

Post by winslowkr »

SageRoot wrote: Mon Aug 12, 2019 4:15 pm Try the UNITS command in Civil 3D. I'm not sure if this is a bug in C3D or not, but if you set the Insertion Scale to US Survey Feet things seem to work out correctly.

Sage
This worked like a charm, thank you. I knew it was something simple. Now if I could just figure out how to do it in Navisworks, I am a total newbe in navisworks.
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