The H-Factor

We've all seen this. You have a nice drawing in front of you, but when you do Zoom Extents (or Zoom All), your drawing disappears and you find yourself floating out somewhere near the (ex)planet Pluto. You select all around outside of what you want to see and there is nothing there.

Sometimes you can zoom around out there and find a stray object and just delete and all is fine. Other times you can copy the 'good' stuff and paste it to another drawing. But what if that fails? The stray objects in question could be damaged entities, or text objects with null text, or blocks with nothing in them.

I had a customer send me such a drawing and after decades of just dealing with it, I wanted to dig deeper. I tried a suggestion whereas you do a Zoom Extents (ZE is one of our aliases) and then hit CTRL+A. This highlights everything in the drawing. The idea here is that you can then see more easily those things out in space, because they have an easy to see grip attached. This didn't work for me.

So I found another video with the right suggestion (from Autodesk no less), for me, for this drawing. This is the link: Erase Empty Objects in AutoCAD

This is what it says to do:

1. Type in ERASE
2. Hit CTRL+A to select everything in the current space of the drawing, seen and unseen
3. Holding down the SHIFT button, grab what you want to keep. This will remove them from the selection set Erase will act upon. The remaining objects may or may not be visible
4. Press Enter

In my drawing, out of 80,000 objects, 12 were erased. A subsequent Zoom Extents now worked perfectly.

HydraCAD has long been able to create a file that can be opened in the JCI/Tyco/SprinkCAD Fluid Delivery Time program. That program is required to open the exported file. Hydratec and SprinkCAD worked together to offer this tool.

The file can be created from HydraCAD using a process similar to AutoCalc. The following is from the HydraCAD manual and the HydraCAD Help file:

Note: The pipe to be exported must be sized. There must be a water supply, at least one flowing head tagged using the Operating Sprinklers command. The drawing should be raised to 3D before executing.

1. The menu command Create Tyco FDT File will create a file that can be opened and calculated in SprinkCALC with the FDT option. Select the command from the HydraTools->Tools->Export menu:

2. An informational message is displayed after launching. Press OK:

3. The below dialog box appears. If the drawing is not already elevated to 3D, pick 1. Raise Drawing to 3D. You will need to restart this command after the drawing is raised in this manner. If the drawing is already raised, pick 2. Generate FDT File:

4. This displays the AutoCalc Setup FDT dialog. None of the settings here affect this particular process, so just pick the Calc button:

If you get an error message, the most probable cause is un-sized pipes. You can cancel the process and size them; otherwise, proceed and fix those pipes in the Tyco program.

5. If there are no errors, the Save As dialog box will appear. Choose a location and give the file a name. The file will have the tych extension:

6. You will get a message stating that you are creating a new file and are given the opportunity to copy the header data from a file you have already created.

Select Yes if you have the Header Data already entered into an existing job.  Select No to open the following dialog box where you can fill in the appropriate information and press OK when you are finished:

7. A message will appear indicating that the file was created. You should now be able to open the file in SprinkCAD FDT:

Way back in the olden days of 2014 I wrote a blog entry on BIM LOD. Sometime between then and now they snuck in a BIM Level 350, so I figured it was time to revisit this topic.

From www.united-bim.com 

In the current context, there are six different levels of development that are defined by the American Institute of Architects (AIA). According to AIA, LOD outlines the design requirements at each stage."

(even their nice picture doesn't show six levels)

At LOD 100, which is the pre-design stage, the model consists of 2D symbols and the masses to signify an element’s existence.

At LOD 200, the elements are partially defined by outlining their approximate quantity, size, shape, and location.

By LOD 300, the elements are defined with exact dimensions and their relative positions bolstering precision.

LOD 350 describes the information about an element precisely and outlines an element’s relation and connection with other components.

LOD 400 outlines the basic information about the construction of various elements.

LOD 500, the model begins representing the real-life functions of elements in a real building.

There is a table of examples on their page as well..

Here's where our software and it's related applications fit in:

LOD 300 

This is your standard AutoCAD / HydraCAD drawing. This is also what Navisworks fits into. And, if you export a HydraCAD drawing to Navis Manage model, it is a precisely drawn model (like the HydraCAD for AutoCAD drawing is) and is defined using exact dimensions, but information is only stored in a few elements

LOD 350

This is your standard HydraCAD for Revit model. Each element has information about the manufacturer, type of fitting, schedule, finish, material, or the like. It also covers Revit models that are generated automatically from HydraCAD for AutoCAD, but you may need to add additional information to some of the elements depending on what the BIM manager wants to see

PS - 

LOD 100 is your basic pen and pencil estimate sketch
LOD 200 is that estimate sketch done in HydraCAD for AutoCAD of even done using Sketch-it or another simple sketch program. It just means that things kind of look like what they are and there is a parts schedule or count
LOD 400 models include all the instructions needed to fabricate and assemble particular elements, even the building
LOD 500 is not used at this time

Here's hoping they don't invent a BIM LOD 375…

When a riser nipple is inserted a property is programmatically set identifying the riser nipple as a Line, Main, Arm-over or Underground for listing purposes. This can be ascertained by looking at the Properties of the rider nipple in question.

Most of the time, the way it is set is perfectly correct. On occasion, however, you might want to list a riser nipple a particular way. This most often happens when a riser nipple connecting a line to a main should be listed as a Main component due to a particular fitting or fabrication method, instead of the default listing configuration of Line. You could change it in the Properties or you can do it a better way:

The Change Riser Nipple Listing Type command will make this easy.  The Edit Riser Nipple command (ERN) on the riser nipple flyout of the Piping toolbar is where you will find it.

Type in ERN and pick the third item on that menu to activate the command.

This command adds a colored diamond to each riser nipple. The color assigned denotes how the riser nipple is defined, for listing purposes.

If you want to change one of those riser nipples, select the Pipes to Change and pick Apply. You will then be prompted to select the riser nipple(s) to change; the ones you select will be filtered based on your above selection.

Picking Exit will clear all the diamonds.

I never knew about this option until Googling about it today related to a customer reported problem.

The problem was related to an old AutoCAD bug which allows a build up of a great number of annotation scales. This will cause a fatal error at various times in a drawing session. But, it won't cause a problem on other machines if the following dialog were set to Always perform…

I had chosen that Always perform… option on my computer, so when reloading the drawing to get this screen capture and send it to our customer, the dialog did not come up, because I told it not to. How to reset it?

Go into AutoCAD Options and select the System tab.

Select the Hidden Messages Settings button

Select the messages you want to un-suppress in the future. I really don't know how many possible dialogs can show up here, but these are the ones I have, apparently, selected on my machine.

Many users prefer to use their own colors, linetypes, lineweights etc. when drafting. HydraCAD is set up to do just that. The only thing you cannot do is to change our layer names. But, you can add your own layers if you want.

The best overall approach is to set up your own template, beginning with a copy of our template. Our templates have all the layers in them that we need to run HydraCAD. If you start with our template, make your changes to it and save it as your own template, you are not overriding the rules of ours, and we aren't stomping on yours after an update. This blog post explains how that should be done: Creating your own templates

Losing HydraCAD Layers

If you use AutoCAD's PURGE command all unused HydraCAD layers (along with other unused layers) will be removed from the drawing. This is bad.

Rebuilding HydraCAD Layers

Use the Rebuild Layer command in the Hydratools->Tools dropdown menu. Or, type in RBL. This will rebuild all of our layers with their settings. It runs the layer script file that comes with HydraCAD, or the one you created, below.

Going forward, do not use AutoCAD's Purge command. Instead, use our Super Purge, on the same menu as Rebuild Layers. Or, type in PUR. Super Purge does a deep purge of unused layer and blocks. It then runs our layer script file (layer.scr), which reinserts layers, blocks and dimension styles that HydraCAD requires to operate. Furthermore, it does an AUDIT to automatically fix drawing database errors.

Replacing our Layer Script with Yours

Open a drawing that has the layers set the way you like them. Then, pick Create Layer Script from this Drawing from the HydraTools->Options drop down menu. This will replace HydraCAD's default layer script with yours.

To replace our settings and add yours, use the Create Layer Script from this Drawing command instead. The next time you use Rebuild HydraCAD Layers (RBL) or Super Purge (PUR), our layer script will be run with your custom settings, not ours.
If you make a mistake and some of our layers are missing or the layer script will not run or locks up, it is easy to get back to our defaults. In that case, use the Restore Original HydraCAD Layers command just below the Create Layer Script from this Drawing command.

Making a Layer Script with Only Your Layers

This will allow you to retain your own added layers and not have them replaced when you run a HydraCAD update. Open a drawing that has the layers set the way you like them. Then, pick Create Layer Script from this Drawing from the HydraTools->Options drop down menu. This will replace HydraCAD's default layer script (Layer.scr) with yours.

Then, pick the command named Edit HydraCAD Layer Script just above it. This allows you to edit this new Layer.scr file directly. Be careful in here, as script files are very sensitive to extra characters. However, if you want to make a new layer script with just your added layers, then use this command and do the following:

1. Keep the first line and the last lines in the new Layer.scr
2. Delete lines that refer to our layers and keep only those lines that refer to yours
3. Save this file with the name MYLAYER.SCR
4. Run the Restore Original HydraCAD Layers command. This will restore our Layer.scr to the shipped version

The next time you use Rebuild HydraCAD Layers (RBL) or Super Purge (PUR), our layer script will be run as well as yours.

To also have your layers listed under the HydraCAD Layers filter in the AutoCAD Layer panel, and have your layer descriptions there as well, then do this:

1. Locate the file named LAYER.DAT in the \HES\HydraCAD\Ver50\Programs\Version5# folder
2. Open this file with Notepad
3. Keep the first line and the last lines in the LAYER.DAT
4. Delete lines that refer to our layers and add in lines that refer to your layers, keeping the same format we have. You can also keep our lines and replace our terms with yours
5. Save this file with the name MYLAYER.DAT

The next time you use Rebuild HydraCAD Layers (RBL) or Super Purge (PUR), your layer names will be added to the HydraCAD Layer filter along with your descriptions.

Today's customer question: "How do you draw an Up/Down sprinkler (Upright on a Tee, with a Pendent Drop) in HydraCAD?"

This is actually easier than it seems. You just have to define the two heads, as usual, and insert them at the same X,Y location (i.e. on top of each other). 

Back in the 'old days', designers would draw such a combination using this symbol: 

In this example, we will create the same symbol as far as looks are concerned

1. Define the Upright head like usual. We suggest using HEAD2 if you haven't already. That is the symbol that looks like this:

This head should be defined as Attached Directly to a Line or Main

2. Define the Pendent head like usual. We suggest using HEAD5 if you haven't already. That is the symbol that looks like this:

This head should be defined as On a Drop

3. Insert one of each of them at the location of the bullhead tee. Notice this looks exactly like the old-school head at top

4. Insert a Drop Window around the pendent head(s). Remember that a drop window will only affect heads on a drop, so it is ignored in the case up upright heads

5. Tag it for listing and run it through!

Notice the Drop was tagged with its info

In HydraLIST, this is what got picked up:

Note 1: If you need an upright on a sprig at the same X,Y location as the pendent, then you would defined HEAD2 as being On a Sprig. You would also place a spring window (using the Drop Window command)

Note 2: If you already used HEAD2 or HEAD5 for some other head definition, you can make create other heads that look the same. Find that info here: Creating Sprinkler Heads