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Sewer Slope Calculation
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blenz
29 Posts
Post 1 of 27
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1644 Views, 26 Replies
09-23-2006 01:31 PM
Has anyone had this problem:
Our company standard is to label pipe length from inside edge of manhole to inside
edge of manhole and calculate the pipe slope using that length and the inverts at the
inside edge of the manhole.
Civil 3D calculates slope from center of manhole to center of manhole, aka the entire
length of pipe in civil 3D. Where as in reality the pipe does not extend to the center of
the manhole.
C3D lets you label the length of the pipe from inside edges, but you cannot calculate
the slope based on this length.
Any suggestions?
BTL
REPLY
Kudo
nzeeben
Post 2 of 27
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09-23-2006 01:48 PM in reply to: blenz
It doesnt matter how long the pipe extends center to center or edge to edge
the slope is the same, you are just shortening or lengthen the pipe.
Not sure I see any problems.
Nick
wrote in message news:5339174@discussion.autodesk.com...
Has anyone had this problem:
Our company standard is to label pipe length from inside edge of manhole to
inside edge of manhole and calculate the pipe slope using that length and
the inverts at the inside edge of the manhole.
Civil 3D calculates slope from center of manhole to center of manhole, aka

the entire length of pipe in civil 3D. Where as in reality the pipe does
not extend to the center of the manhole.
C3D lets you label the length of the pipe from inside edges, but you cannot
calculate the slope based on this length.
Any suggestions?
BTL
REPLY
Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 3 of 27
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I do... let me see if I can articulate it...
--
Dana Breig Probert, E.I.T.
Engineered Efficiency, Inc.
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 2.01 GHz
2GB RAM, 256 MB ATI FireGL V5200
-------------------------------------------
<
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Kudo
Kriss
2 Posts
Post 4 of 27
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Your engineer should change its standard from inside to inside to middle to middle to
provide some conservatism for construction tolerance and to ensure you meet the
minimum slope requirements in tight circumstances... This also enable a bit of
contingency for pipe ordering so that you dont come up short on ordered quantities.
Kriss
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Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 5 of 27
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Ok, I think I convinced Nick that I am not on crack, but in order to
convince myself (and show you my work around for this) I will put a post up
on www.civil3d.com later tonight to show you how you can call out the
inverts wall-to-wall.
--
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
-------------------------------------------
REPLY
Kudo
mmccall
1177 Posts
7 Kudos
Post 6 of 27
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I agree with Kriss for the most part. The center to center calculation has been the
standard for every company I've dealt with for the past 20 yrs in civil design, but then
again my local is just a speck on the globe and civil software should do it's best to
provide solutions for everyone.
While some 'expressions' could provide for some standard reduction in pipe length and
then calculate the slope with that reduced length, it wouldn't jive with the civil
commands for setting the slope of the pipe. (based on the op's account of the c to c
pipe slope calc.)
Even though it's been my company's standard practice to calculate pipes center to
center, just yesterday I had a situation where this didn't make sense to do it this way
for a particular situation. I had to place two large diameter (8 ft.) special storm
drainage structures in a series with a 10 ft. connecting pipe. C3d created an 18 ft pipe
going c. to c. and calculated the slope and inverts based on this length. This was too far
off from what was needed in reality. The solution was to physically move the ends of
the pipes from the center of the structures out to the inside walls. The software will still
accept these as connected pipes as long and their end points are still within the
boundaries of the structure. Moving a structure will cause the pipes to revert to center
connecting points. While this is only a viable solution for small isolated incidences, it
could be a larger solution, for those that need it, if the software were written to end the
pipes short of the center.
anyway, that's my 2 cents.
REPLY
Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 7 of 27
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I can convince all the engineers on the planet to agree with you
But I have municipalities that require design in this fashion to gain

approval.
We can argue hydraulic soundness, best practices and the fact that most of
the world agrees with you until our fingers bleed.
But if I dont get projects approved, I can't feed my kid. well, that is a
bit dramatic. But the fact is I have people wanting to use Civil 3D hard
core right now, and this is a real issue.
--
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
-------------------------------------------
REPLY
Kudo
reed.stephens
41 Posts
Post 8 of 27
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09-24-2006 09:49 AM in reply to: blenz
That is an excellent point Dana. I am just running into a similar problem. The agency
reviewing the sanitary sewer plans for my newest Civil 3D project has a new
requirement that must be addressed on the profile section of our plans. I am sure that
there is some rational use for the information, but it affects the basic design of the
sewer and I have no idea how to get the required information or how to even be sure
that my design will meet the criteria. In addition to a normal design with the drop of
the pipe inverts shown in the center of the structure and slopes calculated accordingly, I
also must show the elevations of the pipe inverts at the manhole walls and the
difference in elevation can not exceed 0.50 feet. At this point I still need to confirm if
they want this information based on the inside or outside face of the structure. I think
this MIGHT be possible with an expression in 2007, but this must remain in 2006. My
initial thought is that I will actually have to design my out inverts higher than my in
inverts on some of the lines with steeper slopes but I have no idea how to get Civil 3D
to design this or label the results.
REPLY
Kudo
blenz
29 Posts
Post 9 of 27
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DBP - I hope nick is still convinced that you are not on crack. However, having just
visited your web site speed does come to mind. Maybe speed is crack but by a different
name, I guess I should spend more time with my dealer.
It is true that a pipe slope calculated based on center to center lengths and elevations
of pipe is different than a slope calculated using center to center elevations and inside
to inside length. Though it really only effects the shorter lengths, maybe less than 100
feet, or so, for not so steep sewers. However that is what I am designing, thus the head
ache.
While I found several bits of information on your web page, including but not limited to
a damn fine looking (though probably not dynamic) corridor, a pulled pork recepie, a
farewell glance at nova scotia and some fond memories of LOGO and its turtle...I could
not find your work around.
Where specifically should I look at civil3d.com?
Thanks, BTL
REPLY
Kudo
blenz
29 Posts
Post 10 of 27
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Our company policy has always been to call out the length and slope of the actual pipe
as it should be built and account for the real world factors in the design. As it is, this
particular sewer is already tight and so additional padding on slopes is not an option. I
have noticed though that for these almost flat sewers the slope calculation is really on
skewed for the shorter runs, less than 100 feet. Also a factor in this particular design is
short pipe lengths.
I think that if C3D lets you call out pipe lengths inside to inside, then it should let you
call out inverts at the inside edge, or allow you to create the pipe to the inside edge,
not the center.
Just my thoughts.
Thanks, BTL
REPLY
Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 11 of 27
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I never got it up. My work around needs more work.
And baby, all of my corridors are dynamic.
--
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
-------------------------------------------
REPLY
Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 12 of 27
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here is the work around that i finally settled on, in a nutshell.
you make a profile that traces the bottom of your pipes and only has
vertices at your inside edges
you make a profile geometry label that calls out the inverts. you can drag
and pin it
this is not dynamic and i am not happy with it
HOWEVER
i needed this profile anyway for some trenching volumes i was working on
using the trenching subassemblies (mad props to my man Nicky Z AGAIN for
helping me there)
so it wasnt such a big whoop.
i am in blog fog but i will get that up there soon enough.
PS blenz, did I know you in a former life? your call sign sounds
familiar...
--
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
-------------------------------------------
REPLY
Kudo
*Dana Breig Probert
Post 13 of 27
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ok this makes me mad now.
i am already stressed cause of this crap data that my husband brings home
and wants me to whip up a rendering on, but here is the kicker
so part of this a run of storm pipe and i am trying to recreate it and get
on with my life but I have these junction boxes that are 36" wide, so my
little structure to structure slope difference isn't insignificant.
I have someone else's design in my hands that is structure to structure and

i am trying to recreate it and it is making me SO ANGRY that there isnt an
easy way to do this. AND the Simpsons is on in 40 minutes.
Dana
--
www.civil3d.com
www.eng-eff.com
----------------------------------
Civil 3D 2007 SP2
-------------------------------------------

Our company policy has always been to call out the length and slope of the
actual pipe as it should be built and account for the real world factors in
the design. As it is, this particular sewer is already tight and so
additional padding on slopes is not an option. I have noticed though that
for these almost flat sewers the slope calculation is really on skewed for
the shorter runs, less than 100 feet. Also a factor in this particular
design is short pipe lengths.
I think that if C3D lets you call out pipe lengths inside to inside, then it
should let you call out inverts at the inside edge, or allow you to create
the pipe to the inside edge, not the center.
Just my thoughts.
Thanks, BTL
REPLY
Kudo
reed.stephens
41 Posts
Post 14 of 27
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I have yet to do my first storm sewer system with Civil 3D, but I know I will also be
facing this issue - only with boxes up to 6' x 6' or larger. Our storm sewers are all
designed with lengths from inside face to inside face. The only solution I found using
LDT Pipeworks was to throw in null structures at each structure face. I was anticipating
having to do the same for storm sewers with Civil 3D.
REPLY
Kudo
peter.a.thomson
Senior Civil Designer
322 Posts
25 Kudos
1 Solution
3 Ideas
Post 15 of 27
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Hooray! Finally we are getting more dialogue on this issue. The ability to have pipes
ending at structure walls is essential for us in NZ to comply with Local authority
requirements in respect of the information we need to tabulate in a profile view.
Peter Funk at AutoDESK asked for more info on this just on Friday and I sent him some
(poor) examples of what we are working towards here in NZ with C3D. I forever live in
hope that he can find a way to tell us that AutoDESK will attend to these wishes quickly
(without having to promise anything that might cause someone to sue him if it doesn't
happen soon enough...) Timing is a huge issue for us to commit to C3D for productive
work.
Dana, I have managed to invent a profile view that starts to give me what I need
tabulated in a profile view. It involved copying a profile over top of itself and having 2
styles, then 2 profile traces along the invert levels, one at inlets and one at outlets.... I
could create bands to represent chainages and levels and depths to (pipe) inverts using
normal profile data bands...with the profile traces on no-plot layers. All in all, a
ludicrous workaround for world class software. I would rather not go there.
I would be happy to be able to tabulate in a pipe network band a vertical line at the
structure cl.....on the LHS (at 90 deg) would be the pipe chainage, GL, IL, Depth to
invert for the INLET side and the RHS of the line would show the outlet data. The
reason for this is that I suspect unless they separate the pipe end inverts (as inlet and
outlet) then they will struggle to tabulate them on small structures in 1 : 500 profile
views as the band data cannot be offset to avoid it writing over each other....weeding
would cause one or both sets of data to vanish.
Seems to me that all that needs to happen (minimum) is
1. To allow access to the surface above any pipe end (at structure inner wall), this
would allow depth to invert for pipes. Note that rim level is not good enough for this as
we often have to leave rim levels protruding above ground or sometimes buried.
2. Keep inlets and outlet pipes ends separate for labelling purposes
3. Allow access to chainage at pipe ends. This means that you can tabulate chainage
and level at pipe ends and the grade calculation can be checked (by disbelievers!) using
the tabulated figures. We could even have a "design" PV that tabulates horiz. angle
change and drop across manhole.
4. the ability to have major and minor chainage info on a PV which reports pipe invert,
ground levels and depths so that checking staff can see at a glance that cover is not
compromised along the pipe length. (change to a documentation style for construction
drawings that gives only the pipe and manhole data if desired)
What would be really nice.

5. the ability to have pipe rules that ensured minimum drop ACROSS manholes for
various ranges of horizontal angle changes (a local authority requirement here in NZ)
6. little dots (like polar tracking) that are grippable in the profile view that extend the
pipe grade to the opposite side of the structure...(required where a steep grade follows
a flat grade)
7. ability to easily show crossing pipes without the need to look at dialogues and use
over-rides. I think of all the pipes info just as geometry and surely this can be
recognised in the software and added as a feature....LDT did it in one hit with "run
interferances".
There are other software packages available here in NZ that do all of these things right
now....I would like to have it in C3D so we can make use of the 14 seats that we
already own on subscription.
I hope that this dialogue grows. If we don't get access to these tools and data, we will
likely have to ditch C3D for this work.
Here is an example of a profile view that I would like to be able to achieve....shouldn't
be too difficult....this is the 1% that I need in C3D.
Timing is a huge issue for this stuff....we can't get it quick enough.
cheers, Peter.
Profile View Pipes Example.pdf 18 KB
REPLY
Kudo
*Rick Graham
Post 16 of 27
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How did you get it to do that offset as the Existing FS? Manually draw in?
Rick
Hooray! Finally we are getting more dialogue on this issue. The ability to
have pipes ending at structure walls is essential for us in NZ to comply
with Local authority requirements in respect of the information we need to
tabulate in a profile view.
Peter Funk at AutoDESK asked for more info on this just on Friday and I sent
him some (poor) examples of what we are working towards here in NZ with C3D.
I forever live in hope that he can find a way to tell us that AutoDESK will
attend to
these wishes quickly (without having to promise anything that might cause
someone to sue him if it doesn't happen soon enough...) Timing is a huge
issue for us to commit to C3D for productive work.
Dana, I have managed to invent a profile view that starts to give me what I
need tabulated in a profile view. It involved copying a profile over top of
itself and having 2 styles, then 2 profile traces along the invert levels,
one at inlets and one at outlets.... I could create bands to repres
ent chainages and levels and depths to (pipe) inverts using normal profile
data bands...with the profile traces on no-plot layers. All in all, a
ludicrous workaround for world class software. I would rather not go there.
I would be happy to be able to tabulate in a pipe network band a vertical
line at the structure cl.....on the LHS (at 90 deg) would be the pipe
chainage, GL, IL, Depth to invert for the INLET side and the RHS of the line
would show the outlet data. The reason for this i
s that I suspect unless they separate the pipe end inverts (as inlet and
outlet) then they will struggle to tabulate them on small structures in 1 :
500 profile views as the band data cannot be offset to avoid it writing over
each other....weeding would cause one or both sets of data to vanish.
Seems to me that all that needs to happen (minimum) is
1. To allow access to the surface above any pipe end (at structure inner
wall), this would allow depth to invert for pipes. Note that rim l
evel is not good enough for this as we often have to leave rim levels
protruding above ground or sometimes buried.
2. Keep inlets and outlet pipes ends separate for labelling purposes
3. Allow access to chainage at pipe ends. This means that you can tabulate
chainage and level at pipe ends and the grade calculation can be checked (by
disbelievers!) using the tabulated figures. We could even have a "design"
PV that tabulates horiz. angle change and drop across manhole.
4. the ability to
have major and minor chainage info on a PV which reports pipe invert,
ground levels and depths so that checking staff can see at a glance that
cover is not compromised along the pipe length. (change to a documentation
style for construction drawings that gives only the pipe and manhole data if
desired)
What would be really nice.

5. the ability to have pipe rules that ensured minimum drop ACROSS manholes
for various ranges of horizontal angle changes (a local authority
requirement he
re in NZ)
6. little dots (like polar tracking) that are grippable in the profile view
that extend the pipe grade to the opposite side of the structure...(required
where a steep grade follows a flat grade)
7. ability to easily show crossing pipes without the need to look at
dialogues and use over-rides. I think of all the pipes info just as
geometry and surely this can be recognised in the software and added as a
feature....LDT did it in one hit with "run interferances".
There are other
software packages available here in NZ that do all of these things right
now....I would like to have it in C3D so we can make use of the 14 seats
that we already own on subscription.
I hope that this dialogue grows. If we don't get access to these tools and
data, we will likely have to ditch C3D for this work.
Here is an example of a profile view that I would like to be able to
achieve....shouldn't be too difficult....this is the 1% that I need in C3D.
Timing is a huge issue for this stuff.
..we can't get it quick enough.
cheers, Peter.
REPLY
Kudo
blenz
29 Posts
Post 17 of 27
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You are lucky that this is just now making you mad!! But very unlucky if you had to
miss the Simpsons for this crap!!
My latest adventures in C3D piping has taken me back to the basics. That is to say I
either tell C3D to draw me a pipe at say 0.4% and it draws it at 0.399%. While
physically not very different, when the authorities look and see 0.399% they say no
way. Or there is the other scenario, where it draws the pipe and labels it as 0.400% and
then as a "disbeliever" I do the math and the slope is really 0.421% or 0.398% but it is
labeled as 0.400% on the profile and the pipe properties. So now I am working with a
center to center program in a edge to edge world and I still have to go through and
manually calculate out my inverts.
We had a civil 3D training session in our office last week and I tried to get an answer
out of that guru, but he did not know...but thought that you could maybe do something
with "Expressions".
Has anyone ever done much work with Expressions? Do you think it could at least help
with labeling? I think the drawn lines are fat enough to cover up the graphics scale, but
the dynamic labels are key!!
Gracias,
BTL
P.S. While it is a small world, it must have been in a past life that my call sounds
familiar. Unless, you have spent a lot of time in Wyoming ('cus I don't get out much) or
you attended national engineering conferences back in your days at the university.
Beyond that I hav only met one other person with my name and that was at a Sam's
Club in Idaho. Of course I reckon that I could be famous and not even know it!!
REPLY
Kudo
peter.a.thomson
Senior Civil Designer
322 Posts
25 Kudos
1 Solution
3 Ideas
Post 18 of 27
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Hi Rick,
yes, that was manually drawn in....but it shows what I mean by offsetting text so it can
be read. many other software packages can do this....so why can't we have it in C3D as
well? It just seems so illogical to me to have to lose data because it can't fit the text
in....offsetting of text in longsections has been going on since Adam was a
cowboy.....sorry to burst your bubble...
cheers
REPLY
Kudo
ralstogj
664 Posts
33 Kudos
20 Solutions
Post 19 of 27
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As I have just moved company recently and are now using civil3d and not LDD I am
going thru the process of setting up some pipe profile templates and have run into the
same issue.
A real life example of why we need this functional in Civil 3d is that in New Zealand with
have to put sand filters and retention tanks in all over the place and these can be upto
6 to 10 metres long and so you have to have the grades run from the outside of these
structures to the next structure.
I have tried a couple of things today to work round this issue without success
I throught I could write and expression to revise the pipe invert line at the centreline of
the structure centreline to the outside wall. A got part of the way a without much
success and realised this may give me the right text answer in the bandset of the
profile but the pipe and structure long section will still look wrong.
Regards
Justin
I note that in the developers help a pipe has a property that id's the start and end
structure so it should not be that hard to write some vb that calculates the distance to
the outside wall of the structure from the structure centreline from say subtracting half
the structures length of that end of the pipe then the pipe could be redrawn to stop at
the outside wall of the structure.
Regards
Justin Ralston
http://c3dxtreme.blogspot.com/
REPLY
Kudo
blenz
29 Posts
Post 20 of 27
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Justin -
I am no CAD guru, but I have been reading a lot of the discussion group gossip on this
and there may be a couple of things:
Given the size of some of your structures you may be able to connect the pipe to the
structure and then shorten it as close as it will let you to the structure wall. The catch
here is that if you move the structure the pipe resets itself to the center of the
structure.
Have you tried turning on the masking property of your structure so that the pipes
inside are not shown on plan or profile view?
Cheers,
BTL
REPLY
Kudo
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Civil 3D calculates slope from center of manhole to center of manhole, aka

anyway, that's my 2 cents.

But I have municipalities that require design in this fashion to gain

And baby, all of my corridors are dynamic.

this is not dynamic and i am not happy with it

so it wasnt such a big whoop.

i am in blog fog but i will get that up there soon enough.

I have someone else's design in my hands that is structure to structure and

wrote in message news:5340392@discussion.autodesk.com...

What would be really nice.

Profile View Pipes Example.pdf 18 KB

What would be really nice.

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