Grid to ground in Civil 3D Survey is a hard corundum. It must be Ruby Tuesday. Say What?
Wait a minute. Isn’t today Thursday?
Dude. Ruby Tuesday is a reference to an old Rolling Stones tune.
They say the song is about the woman who left Keith Richards for Jimi Hendrix.
Hotter licks seemed to matter back then.
A corundum is a mineral, a crystal, a stone - aka a ruby.
As a matter of face it’s not really a corundum I mean is it?
Grid to Ground in Civil 3D is a Conundrum
A problematic puzzle often expressed with puns is a different thing entirely.
Folks do ask for explanations and solutions to the grid to ground problem in Civil 3D, Infraworks, et al.
Such a Civil 3D how to is indeed priceless – much like some red rubies and blue sapphires.
“My Civil 3D survey stuff doesn’t match up with my Bing Maps? I know my drawing State Plane coordinate system is right. I even applied the recent AutoCAD Geolocation Hotfix. Help!”
Why do you care? I’m not being sarcastic. Seriously, there are reasons and there are reasons that reflect the same sort of confusion as mingling up a corundum with a conundrum.
We all have to work to learn to understand.
We know that the Civil 3D diva is merciless.
She assumes you’ve planned ahead, already know what you are doing, and how to execute in the software. This DOES make learning to do the do difficult.
Doing Offers the Eyes to See
After some serious seek and you shall find the best Grid to Ground in Civil 3D et al presentation I’ve been able to find is by Lucy Kuhns in a presentation she did at last year’s AU 2016.
Lucy has some fun with sample data right at the prime meridian and other historic projects.
Sadly, AU Online won’t let us share and reference the video directly so here’s the link.
You might want to bookmark it or this post.
TR22180: Advanced Survey Functionality in AutoCAD Civil 3D 2017 and InfraWorks 360
Yes. You can even download the usual AU class goodies.
No. The title of the class certainly isn’t a dead giveaway of the subject matter. Back in the day I’ve had the powers that be do that to my own AU class titles. Sadly, it seems I’m not always politically correct.
If you employ Lucy’s point label Expression trick, remember to put those Expressions in an +ALWAYS IMPORT style. This old A Matter of Expressions post explains. Sadly, the Expression import problem still comes and goes. Be safe not sorry.
The Framework for Civil 3D works and the proof is in the details.
Did the Lights Go On?
Maybe…maybe not. Other grid to ground working perspectives may be the solution for you. You’ll also find another couple of wacks at the topic by other knowledgeable folk in our Civil Web Training >> Civil 3D Survey section. Alan’s Grid to Ground videos are shorter and sweet. After Lucy’s explanations they may make a lot more sense.
Further Meridian Drift
I will leave, and I hope not confuse, you with the John Sayre video that covers the creation and use of Shared Reference points in multiple Autodesk products. Maybe this is what you actually need. It is certainly best you know the Shared Reference point tools exist.