Question before buying WaterCad

Hello rpsmith,

You had posted a similar question here:

Can WaterCad import survey files?

Can you elaborate on what your end goals are for a water model? Here are a few comments based on your description:

1) The Terrain Extractor (Trex) tool in WaterCAD can automatically assign elevations to nodes in the model, based on a terrain model from your survey data. Various DTM/DEM formats are supported. See related wiki article on Trex: Using Terrain Extractor (Trex)

2) You can import the pipes and nodes (including attributes like friction coefficients, if you have them) from an outside data source if you have one, such as a DXF, Shapefile, database, etc. The model would need to be built first before the elevations can be extracted with Trex. You can also lay out elements manually and enter the physical parameters such as the friction coefficients. More information on Modelbuilder can be found here: Building and updating a model using ModelBuilder

3) Profiles can be created, which can display the physical elevation along with the hydraulic grade line along a chosen length of piping.

4) As for "isometric or 3D piping diagrams" - the printouts from WaterCAD are of the plan view. It is rare to have a need for a 3D representation of a wide-area network such as a water distribution system since it would mostly appear flat. However, this could potentially be done by way of exporting the model to a 3D i-model. More on this here: Can WaterGEMS/CAD or HAMMER display elements in 3D?

Hello rpsmith,

You had posted a similar question here:

Can WaterCad import survey files?

Can you elaborate on what your end goals are for a water model? Here are a few comments based on your description:

1) The Terrain Extractor (Trex) tool in WaterCAD can automatically assign elevations to nodes in the model, based on a terrain model from your survey data. Various DTM/DEM formats are supported. See related wiki article on Trex: Using Terrain Extractor (Trex)

2) You can import the pipes and nodes (including attributes like friction coefficients, if you have them) from an outside data source if you have one, such as a DXF, Shapefile, database, etc. The model would need to be built first before the elevations can be extracted with Trex. You can also lay out elements manually and enter the physical parameters such as the friction coefficients. More information on Modelbuilder can be found here: Building and updating a model using ModelBuilder

3) Profiles can be created, which can display the physical elevation along with the hydraulic grade line along a chosen length of piping.

4) As for "isometric or 3D piping diagrams" - the printouts from WaterCAD are of the plan view. It is rare to have a need for a 3D representation of a wide-area network such as a water distribution system since it would mostly appear flat. However, this could potentially be done by way of exporting the model to a 3D i-model. More on this here: Can WaterGEMS/CAD or HAMMER display elements in 3D?