Page Contents
Introduction
The WinCan 3D Application renders geometric objects in a user friendly way that allows the data to be easily navigated in any orientation.
There are tools in the menu lists for setting the view styles of each layer and the visibility of layers and I have modified these from the default settings for the purposes of this page, to help explain the concepts here.
The application works by rendering layers and these layers can be turned on and off at will.
Here is a simple VX project with one section, created from observations only so is a straight line, and one lateral, created using the 3D Simulator so is a more complex shape:
Here is the basic view of the section using ‘Wireframe’ rendering which allows us to see things that are inside other things:
See the main section has 2 elements:
Brown - this is the pipe, the section and it is rendered at the dimensions specified in the VX project data, 400mm diameter in this case.
Blue - this is WKT string of the inspection, which is the pure geometric line that is stored in the WinCan VX database. It is rendered as a tube with a nominal system diameter, but it is not really a tube, just a line string, but it allows us to see the pure object and how it is position at the bottom of the pipe in all cases. The reason for this is because drainage dimensions are always calculated this way by engineering design, because this is where the water flows.
The Lateral Connection
Let’s look more closely at the lateral connection. In this case, the lateral is plotted at 2 o’clock in an upstream TV inspection from the section lower node, and the lateral defined as 150mm diameter. The lateral was created automatically by WinCan VX.
There are 3 lines here, but you have to look carefully to see two of them in this case:
Green - this is the lateral, more on this part later.
Blue - this is the same as on the section, it is the inspection shape and see that it starts from the edge of the pipe, known as the RAP position.
Pink - this is shape of the measurement and in this case it is in exactly the same position as the inspection line because only one measurement was made here, and the lateral shape was set from it. Like the inspection line, it also starts at the RAP position.
If we look more closely at this first segment of the lateral shape, we see the first two points of the line string are the AP and the RAP:
The AP is at the same coordinates as observation code for the lateral that is on the section inspection line.
The RAP is at the coordinates calculated from the section pipe size (400mm here) and the observation clock positions (2 o’clock here). This is where the inspection and the measurement shapes begin.
We can also always see the AP and the RAP in WinCan Map, by using the Info Tool and inspecting the GIS data, because the first point in the line string is always the AP point, and the second point is always the RAP point:
