Surface Profile Wont Plot

[gvdpeor]

I'm having trouble with the Surface Profile command. I'm loading a surface that I created using tins received from a surveyor and I've created a 3d alignment. The expected image shows up in the window, but when I try to plot the profile, I get nothing. No error or notice. I've verified that I'm plotting on an unlocked layer, and it's not frozen. I'm running AutoCAD 2024 and I've updated cad tools to the latest version.

Any ideas?
Thanks

[Lars]

Hi,
Try to open a new drawing and do the same there.
How long is your profile (Alignment)? Are you a registered user?

/Lars

[gvdpeor]

Yes. I'm a registered user from a long time ago. My cross sections are only a couple hundred feet but there will be many of them. I've been able to use the surface profile many times in the past, however, there have been several upgrades since then.

The tin I'm using is a little different. The surveyor is using what's called a polyface mesh which is new to me. I exploded it and it devolved into individual 3d faces which I then imported into a surface which I saved to file. I did an 'Edit View" plot and it looked OK, but never yielded a profile plot.

[gvdpeor]

My Cadtool registration code is XXXXXXX, received in June of 2018. Do I need to renew?

[Lars]

Hi,
No you don't need to do anything about the registering.

There has not been any issues reported on the Profile command. Could you try with a previous surface or draw a couple of 3Dpolylines, edit elevation of some of them and triangulate them in CadTools, draw a 3Dpolyline (Alignment) ant test to create a surface profile.

I think there might be som problems with converting of the surface. If you are importing a surface from other software it should contain triangles of 3DPolylines or 3dFaces. After import you can plot the surface perimeter using "Edit/View" Surface.

To create a surface from other types of lines you can triangulate all triangle edged as separate surveyed lines (breaklines) by doing as follow.
Explode the surface multiple time until you get separate lines.
Triangulate all lines with the checkbox "Use lines as breaklines" checked and "on Layer" : Here you select same layer as your exploded breaklines are placed on.
After triangulation, plot the triangles and perimeter, snap a 3DPolyline between a couple of triangles and try to plot a surface profile.

/Lars

[gvdpeor]

Actually, I think it was registration. I had to replace my computer recently and I downloaded a new version of CadTools. Just this morning I registered with my old number and now it seems to be working. I also did a couple of other things such as rebuilding the surface from the surveyors 3d faces and tweaked a couple of settings on the Surface Profile screen. Not exactly sure what did it but its working now.
Thanks

[Lars]

That's Greate!

Probably due to the registration, unregistered CadTools is limited to surface profile lengths (200). You should have received a notification about it (maybe it was hidden beneath another object)

/Lars