Asking for someone..are there any issues converting from Civil 3D to Microstation?
Are you asking about the conversion of files between the two??ÿ Or are you asking about a user frustration level?
After using both for years I derived Paden's second rule of the universe:?ÿ Those that use both are proficient with neither.?ÿ 😉
Your questions are limited. Microstation is the CAD platform as is AutoCAD. CAD is the media upon which we draft upon, such as paper, vellum or mylar. Civil apps increase the drafting production and perform analysis.?ÿ
AutoDesk has a Civil3d that runs on top of the AutoCAD engine. Bentley has several Civil Applications that run on top of Microstation including InRoads/OpenRoads, MxRoads and GEOPak.
The CAD elements can be converted to Microstation will little effort.?ÿ
The enhanced civil applications are propeitory to each vendor. The latest versions of of CAD software have embbed civil applications that do not transfer well. It depends which version.?ÿ
It can be done.
There are issues! Different beasts!
A simple save as dgn won??t give you the usual microstation objects every user is so fond of.
I think the best way may be by converting your data to landxml to exchange in both directions.
I started with AutoCad 2.something and after a few years used Microstation 4.?ÿ I've used both over the years.?ÿ It has always seemed that both companies revel in making sure there is always some level of incompatibility.?ÿ
Christ is spot on... "Different beasts".?ÿ
Not without many headaches.?ÿ The only thing we convert between the 2 is surfaces and this is only because of most insane surface editing/processing cluster f of a program MS is.?ÿ
We ran into too many issues trying to convert other components as they never come across in a functional manner.
Civil 3d has a function within it to "Export to AutoCAD". Which highlights that there are a lot of elements within a C3d drawing that even AutoCAD won't play with. Within the same area there is also export to various editions of Microstation. I have no idea how well that works.?ÿ
Microstation will open .dwg files and save to that format as well. But how well the various C3d objects get interpreted is unknown to me. If you are dealing with only vanilla AutoCAD elements I'd bet that it does very well.?ÿ ?ÿ?ÿ
If you reference a civil3d dwg into microstation you will see a whole bunch of squares around civil 3d features that microstation doesn't jive with (survey points, symbol blocks, survey figures, etc.). To resolve: in c3d export> as acad dwg (this dumbs down all the civil3d features to more basic simple entities that can be seen in microstation).?ÿ Once you have the "saved back" acad dwg version, it should reference into microstation cleanly.
I typically then start a new microstation dgn (set to correct units and coord.sys., that also uses the microstation seed file that I need, typically a DOT seed file which sets me up with there levels(microstation lingo for layers), then reference in the acad dwg and copy from the reference into the dgn layer by layer, assigning to the appropriate DOT level.?ÿ Toggling on and off the reference during allows me to keep track of what I've got left to copy.?ÿ If you do this a lot it can be automated with a conversion template, but I haven't yet found the need.?ÿ Also the whole process I describe in this paragraph is really just for the more annoying conversion of getting a c3d dwg that is non-DOT standards into a microstation dgn matching DOT standards.?ÿ
If I don't have the need to change the layering/appearance of the source c3d dwg- I just export it back to acad and then reference it into a new microstation dgn and bind/copy everything into the dgn.
I don't typically export a dgn from within autocad. For me, being able to control the units/coordinate system of the destination dgn from within microstation is more feel good. If you don't have microstation and a client is just asking for an dgn version of a dwg, I would recommend just saving back to acad and providing that.?ÿ Though theres also the challenge of ensuring the coordinates aren't shifted in the conversion, one of my biggest worries and items I feel I am constantly policing. If you don't have microstation and must export a dgn from c3d I really don't recall if?ÿ you can do it with a c3d drawing that has civil3d features.?ÿ My approach to be safe would be to export to acad (non-c3d dwg), and then go in there and export that to dgn.?ÿ I would also leave big text directly in my modelspace of what the coordinate system/datum is, and also label at least 2 coordinates in the drawing, so if someone else is opening it in microstation they can check to make sure they didn't mess up the microstation units/system.
No matter what, when converting between c3d and microstation, I always check the coordinate of a couple vertices in the original and converted drawings at the end. No one wants a survey foot/international foot issue to bite them later.
Another side note:?ÿ When going the other direction- exporting a dwg from within microstation, it works well and is easy to do (no saving back the microstation dgn or anything).?ÿ However, While microstation is able to export a dwg format, it is not able to properly assign the coordinate system.?ÿ So if you have a microstation dgn set to NY east 83 zone (u.s. s.ft) and you export a dwg, when you then open the dwg in c3d it will be set to?ÿ no coord.system - international ft. The values of everything are correct, you just need to assign the coordinate system and save. This is just relabeling the xy axis in c3d, it's?ÿ not reprojecting anything.?ÿ Again, final check, always compare sample vertices in original and destination drawings.
For converting surfaces from c3d to microstation I always directly use all the tin triangles, not xml. I have found this to be safer, as exporting an xml surface from c3d is exporting the breaklines, points, boundary, but not the exact triangulation. When I import the xml into Inroads in microstation to rebuild, Inroads may rebuild the surface using the same contraints (points breaklines boundary), but the triangles that are open for interpretation it may build slightly different than c3d.?ÿ I may be wrong on this because its been awhile since I've tried doing it with xml, but way back that was my understanding.?ÿ My typical workflow is to set c3d surface to tin view, then extract objects> extract 3d faces/triangles, and then do the same with the surface boundary. Then I bring the drawing with 3d faces and boundary over to microstation and import all the triangles into an inroads surface as breaklines, and the boundary as a perimeter. Then let inroads rebuild it.?ÿ Just my way of doing it, just like anything I'm sure theres many other adequate ways.?ÿ
If you're asking about format conversions, Civil 3D has a 'export to other formats' routine where you can find DNG format for export. Also, I remember that Microstation can open direct dwg files natively.
Going from one to the other is possible but if you're looking for a smooth transition between the two, you might be hard pressed to find one.
There are some "converters" out there but I haven't used them.
Also, it depends if you're wanting to take civil objects to Microstation as well. If so, you would be better off converting linework, then doing an import of points so you have a .prj and the proper cells are inserted.
Good luck!
Thank you all.
From experience I will tell you it is extremely painful to get C3D objects into MicroStation.?ÿ The AutoCad objects are simple.?ÿ The DTM can be exported as a LandXML file.?ÿ Points and feature lines are a real pain.?ÿ It is time consuming but can be done though.?ÿ I recently did a couple of miles of topo for ODOT.
