Mastering AutoCAD® Civil 3D® 2010

714 CHAPTER 20 OUT THE DOOR: PLAN PRODUCTION

With these elements in place, you’re ready to dive in and create some sheets. The general steps

in creating a set of plans are as follows:

1. Meet the prerequisites listed previously.

2. Create view frames.

3. Create sheets.

4. Plot or publish (hardcopy or DWF).

The next section describes this process in detail and the tools used in plan production.

Using View Frames and Match Lines

When you create sheets using the Plan Production tool, Civil 3D first automatically helps you

divide your alignment into sections that will fit on your plotted sheet and display at the desired

scale. To do this, Civil 3D creates a series of rectangular frames placed end to end (or slightly

overlapping) along the length of alignment, like those in Figure 20.1. These rectangles are referred

to as view frames and are automatically sized and positioned to meet your plan sheet requirements.

This collection of view frames is referred to as a view-frame group. Where the view frames abut one

another, Civil 3D creates match lines that establish continuity from frame to frame by referring to

the previous or next sheet in the completed plan set. View frames and match lines are created in

Model space, using the prerequisite elements described in the previous section.

Figure 20.1

View frames and match

lines

Match line

View frames

TheCreateViewFramesWizard

The first step in the process of creating plan sets is to generate view frames. Civil 3D provides an

intuitive wizard that walks you through each step of the view frame–creation process. Let’s look

at the wizard and the various page options. After you’ve seen each page, you’ll have a chance to

put what you’ve learned into practice.

You launch the Create View Frames Wizard (Figure 20.2) by selecting the Create View Frames

button on the Plan Production panel found on the Output tab of the ribbon. The wizard consists of

several pages. A list of these pages is shown along the left side, and an arrow indicates which page

you’re currently viewing. You move among the pages using the Next and Back navigation buttons

along the bottom of each page. Alternatively, you can jump directly to any page by clicking its

USING VIEW FRAMES AND MATCH LINES 715

name in the list on the left. The following sections walk through the pages of the wizard and

explain their features.

Figure 20.2

The Create View Frames

Wizard

Alignment Page

You use the first page to select the alignment and station range along which the view frames will

be created.

Alignment In the first section of this page, you select the alignment along which you want to

create view frames. You can either select it from the drop-down menu or click the Select from

the Drawing button to select the alignment from the drawing.

Station Range In the Station Range section, you define the station range over which the

frames will be created. Selecting Automatic creates frames from the alignment Start to

the alignment End. Selecting User Specified lets you define a custom range, by either keying in

Start and End station values in the appropriate box or by clicking the button to the right of the

station value fields and graphically selecting the station from the drawing.

Sheets Page

You use the second page of the wizard (Figure 20.3) to establish the sheet type and the orientation

of the view frames along the alignment. A plan production sheet is a layout tab in a drawing file.

To create the sheets, Civil 3D references a predefined drawing template (.dwt) file. As mentioned

earlier, the template must contain layout tabs, and in each tab the viewport’s extended data prop-

erties must be set to either Plan or Profile. Later in this chapter, you’ll learn about editing and

modifying templates for use in plan production.

Sheet Settings In Civil 3D 2010, the Plan Production feature provides options for creating

three types of sheets:

Plan and Profile This option generates a sheet with two viewports; one viewport shows

a plan view and the other shows a profile view of the section of the selected alignment

segment.