Trimble Business Center

I work since quite a few years with TBC but never had to do that specific task in TBC, only in Terramodel were it is no trouble at all.

I did check the help but couldn't find anything better. But maybe I miss the forest for the trees.

Does anybody have a better workflow to create a series of points at different chainages receiving the line elevation than:

:1

-create point

-right click in coordinate field

-scroll down to offset from line

-select line

-enter chainage and offset

-right click into elevation field

-scroll to along line snap

-select line again

-enter chainage again

-click add point

goto :1 and do it all over again

compared to the GC65 in Terramodel that is a pain

there you select the line once and just enter different chainages, hit enter and it's done

 _Create Point by Station Offset macro by Trimble.

Try "Create Dependent Points" option. Just love it.

or

Import Station Offset Point import format

if you have all the points in CSV format

I did miss that one. But it still has the following draw backs for my purpose.

1. the line needs to be converted into an alignment first

2. the elevation is not taken from the alignment, needs to be entered

Especially the second point critical. I don't have the elevation, it needs to be derived from the line at that station and maybe a vertical offset applied.

I have to create points at certain chainages along, and 500 mm below the top line of several retaining walls.

Since it's not that many points for now I might stick to my approach or even go to Terramodel for now.

Like with entering a Line String we could use an option to use Station/Offset for points as well.

 although that one can be a bit painful as well since it is deleting the distance along field every time

Works on the linestrings and interpolates RL from the line.

I want a second green star for that one!

Can't give you the star yet. I don't have regular intervals. And even if I had lets say 10 m interval the first point is usually at a random station, would have to break the line first. At lot of trouble to create offset points.

Grab your linestring, convert to an alignment. 

Create corridor, create a single node with offset 0.00 using Table option for chainages.

Generate surface.

Explode Surface.

You have vertices where you need them.

Done.

Star?

It's a solution but quite complicate for a simple thing like point at station, don't you think.

I thought you meant the solved star. You definitely get the Helpful star. Never saw them before.

Ronny, one week of wet weather in Cairns and I am sure we will have it sorted using ironPhyton 

I agree with you, its is unnecessarily quite complicated. Teramodel had a plethora of useful commands at our disposal. Imagine to migrate all commands from TML list into TBC TMLs. 

when I am using your method:

-create point

-right click in coordinate field

-scroll down to offset from line

-select line

-enter chainage and offset

-right click into elevation field

-scroll to along line snap

-select line again

-enter chainage again

-click add point

goto :1 and do it all over again

my elevation is populated automatically. No need to "re click" on the same chainage...

I share your sentiment. #bringbackterramodel

Runny

Marian is correct. You need to install all the TMLs if you don't have them - use TML Status from www.rockpilesolutions.com web page - use your Trimble ID to log in and that will let you download and install all the TMLs easily

Let me know if you need help

Alan

Hi Alan,

I did miss the macro. But see my comment above. It doesn't fit my purposes.

TBC Help  

This is an easy way to blast 100's of points in quickly.

I used to calculate entire projects in excel and then import them this way.

Shea

Hi Shea,

thanks for that, but that doesn't fit my purpose.

Especially that you have to enter the actual elevation. I need to get the elevation at that specific station from the line/alignment itself, and maybe an additional vertical offset.

Also that you need to have alignments first is an extra step I'd like to avoid.

Just pick a line, enter stations and offsets and be done.

It wasn't that many points and I went with my procedure and am done with it for the time being. But we really could use a better point at station function. Especially one were we don't have to enter an actual elevation but a vertical offset from a line/alignment.

Try using the Create Sideslope Command - that works with Alignments or Linestrings, You can enter all types of Station, Offset /  Station, Elevation / Station, Slope / Station, Delta Elevation, you can set a Start and End Station, You can define all of the Stations you want in a Table and you can create that in Excel and Copy and Paste into the table, you can do multiple offsets in one pass and it even works with Station Equations and it will tie to surfaces with complex sideslopes if you want. I use this all the time when I have something none standard. It also uses the source line vertical to compute the Elevations and the Source Lines can incorporate all Geometrical Elements - Vertical Curves (symmetrical and asymmetrical, Spirals, Arcs and Vertical Arcs. 

Or you can use the Offset Slope Macro and that will allow you to pick a pair of lines, extend by an offset to Line and at a Slope based on the slope between the two lines. It also allows you to define an Interval and a Start and End point or you can use the source line interval. 

Alan

Hello Alan,

thanks for the tip, the side slope command does actually do the job. 

But that is no straight forward job, you also have to enter the stations twice, once in each table, or use Excel to create a table. And in the end you also have to explode the side slope and run the create from cad command to actually get the points and a coordinate list, CSV file. I might try it next time I have to do anything like that again and I have the right Edition available.

It's only included in the Site Modeling Edition, I would expect to have a simple CAD point at station/offset in one of the lower editions.