Converter doesn't seem to work

[GaryM]

Hi Folks --

Just DL'd the trial version of Arcv2cad today. Not having much luck with it, I'm afraid. It either crashes or produces unreadable DXF files, depending on which options are selected.

I'm trying to produce a useful TIN from a 2' contour shapefile. The plan was to translate the shapefile to a DXF drawing, import that into AC3D or Sketchup for texturing.

If the "Features" box is checked (and either or both of the two included fields both selected), and ACAD v. 14 chosen, then Arcv2cad crashes, with the messages "save attempted to incompatible version", and "Error writing file . . . /~temp00.dwg".

If the same features are selected and ACAD 2004 is chosen, Arcv2cad hangs at about 12%, never completing.

If no features are selected, the conversion seems to complete, but the resulting file is unreadable by either AC3D or Sketchup. (AC3D loads it without error messages, but the file is empty. Sketchup crashes trying to load it).

Will this software do what I want it to do? If so, what settings (for features and elevation) should I be using?

Thx!

[GuthCAD Software Support]

Hi Gary,

Is it possible for you to email me your shapefile so that we can reproduce the error here? (Send to our support email address (http://www.guthcad.com/contact.htm). Send the 3 files, .SHP, .SHX, .DBF)

Will this software do what I want it to do? Well hopefully, yes. We have tried to reproduce the errors that you have reported here, but have not been sucessful so far, so it would be useful if you can send your shapefile.

If so, what settings (for features and elevation) should I be using?No features need to be selected for what you want to do. For elevation you should select the 'Elevation Key' to be the field that contains the contour elevations.

Best regards,
GuthCAD Software Suport

[GaryM]

Sent a link to the shapefile. Too large to email.

Thanks!

[GuthCAD Software Support]

Gary,

Thanks for the link to the shapefile.

I think that the problem is simply that the shapefile is very large (300,000+ contours.) We did the translation here without selecting any features, and it was successful. The output DWG was about 280MB. AutoCAD complained that there was not enough memory available to read the resultant DWG (on a machine with 3GB memory). However on selecting 'Ignore' it does in fact load the drawing.

So to work with this shapefile you need to do it using tiling. Arcv2CAD's 'Region' filter allows translations of rectangular sections of the drawing. Unfortunately there is currently nothing much automated in the filter, so you need to manually calculate and select coordinates for each region. As a starter try translating a small region. For the shapefile you pointed me to, start with using the coordinates:

min x,y = 2475000,232750.45
max x,y = 2490000,240000.00

Select TOPO_ELEV8 as the Elevation field.

The result will be a DXF or DWG file of LWPOLYLINES with Elevations.

Then do a test import into AC3D or Sketchup to see how each goes with importing the DXF or DWG.

You mentioned producing a TIN. I assume that you meant that AC3D or Sketchup can produce TINs from contours with elevations. (Arcv2CAD 5 does not do that.)

PS. If you are unable to do a translation even of a small region of the shapefile, it means that your machine does not have enough memory.

PPS. We selected the output format as AutoCAD 2000 DWG. Assuming that AC3D or Sketchup can read AutoCAD 2000 DXF or DWG, we would recommend that as the output format.

So, good luck!
Software Support