Any civil3d experts here?

The the Civil 3d drop down at top left-->Drawing utilities-->Drawing settings for starters. This will show if a coordinate system has been assigned and what units are assigned.

The the Civil 3d drop down at top left-->Drawing utilities-->Drawing settings for starters. This will show if a coordinate system has been assigned and what units are assigned.

 

This.  The units may be specified in your coordinate system, then also as Drawing Units in this same dialog.

Also type command "units" to check drawing insertion units.

Honestly, I reached an impasse with Civil3D on this kind of thing the other day when connecting to a geodatabase and had to resort to ArcMap.

Civil3D does not always handle coordinate systems well. 

quote]

Civil3D does not always handle coordinate systems well. 

No kidding! You also have to be aware whether the units are Feet or US Survey Feet. That has bitten us before.

The the Civil 3d drop down at top left-->Drawing utilities-->Drawing settings for starters. This will show if a coordinate system has been assigned and what units are assigned.

 

Bingo - that was it.

The units were wrong and no coordinate system defined.

Saved data now appears where expected

Thanks for your help

Yes this can def bite you in the butt. Also, set the projection info & units prior to saving any new drawings. Set it both in the projection tab & units tab under the big “A” icon - imported a set of points the other day & forgot to do so somehow so everything was exactly the same distance apart from an X-REF’d previous survey that was setup correctly 

@ncsudirtman

Thanks for the tip.

My copy of civil3d is very 'raw' - no real setup, templates etc.

What gets me is that the original file 'works'

But the save screws it up

Guess it is not just Access that has it's quirks

You also have to be aware whether the units are Feet or US Survey Feet. That has bitten us before.

I'm might be going out on a limb, but going to assume that Jim isn't working in US feet in NZ

You also have to be aware whether the units are Feet or US Survey Feet. That has bitten us before.

I'm might be going out on a limb, but going to assume that Jim isn't working in US feet in NZ

That's pretty unpatriotic of them! 

@ncsudirtman

Thanks for the tip.

My copy of civil3d is very 'raw' - no real setup, templates etc.

What gets me is that the original file 'works'

But the save screws it up

Guess it is not just Access that has it's quirks

 

Setup Civil3d .DWT templates with all the appropriate coordinate system and unit settings.  Then, when you start a new drawing, choose the appropriate template and you're good to go.

My copy of civil3d is very 'raw' - no real setup, templates etc.

Setup Civil3d .DWT templates with all the appropriate coordinate system and unit settings.  Then, when you start a new drawing, choose the appropriate template and you're good to go.

Your C3d experience will dramatically improve once you have prepared a template to work from. But don't expect to get it all set up in one go. Do it in stages and improve on it.  I've been working on mine for 7 years.

My workflow has always been to export DXFs from Civil 3D using WBLOCK, so I can strip out any unimportant items (and layers) to reduce file bloat and crew confusion, and also so I can choose "Unitless" as the export unit to avoid any possible scaling/shift errors.

~15 years of C3D usage has taught me that DWG format is much more likely to burn you than DXF when importing to other software packages...

@norman-oklahoma 

Actually I dont expect to set up any templates at all.

I'm using it for data manipulation and examination - not production.

All I really need is 'plain Jane' AutoCAD

~15 years of C3D usage has taught me that DWG format is much more likely to burn you than DXF when importing to other software packages...

Yes, oh yes. So very true.