Have you ever wondered how Civil 3D Pipe Network pipes and structures change their appearance?  You may be using a company template without thinking much about it, and then one day you are asked to make pipes of a certain size or material differentiated from others.  Below is how you can assign styles to pipes before and after they are created.

By Default, all pipe and structure styles in a Civil 3D Pipe Network are inherited from the parts list assigned to that network.  Each pipe network can only have one parts list assigned to it. You can find the parts list assigned to a pipe network by selecting any part in that network and going to Network Properties in the Modify panel of the Pipe Networks ribbon.

The parts list assigned to that network is halfway down the Layout Settings tab on the left-hand side like so:

How to Edit Default Pipe Styles for Pipes

All styles in CivIl 3D reside in the Toolspace on the Settings tab.  The Settings tab also happens to be where the parts lists are located.  Each part in a pipe network parts list can be set to a unique style as needed.  However, assigning the pipe style in the parts list will only edit the style for those pipes that are created after this change is made.

From the Civil 3D Workspace>Home Tab>Palettes panel, make sure you have both Toolspace and the settings icon on (highlighted in Blue)

In the Toolspace panel, go to the Settings tab and scroll down until you see “Pipe Network”.  Expand Pipe Network>Parts Lists and right-click on the list that you wish to edit to open the Network Parts List dialog.

From this dialog you will see two tabs in the middle for Pipe and Structures.  Each have an entire column dedicated to style.  Simply find the part that you wish to edit and assign the new style of your choosing.  Here, I have created a new style that changes the display color of my 24” pipe to green rather than blue.

How to Edit Styles for Pipes that Already are Drawn.

If you have pipes that already exist in the model, these can also be assigned as style from the Toolspace.  Go to the Toolspace>Prospector tab.  Expand Pipe Networks > Networks and the name of the network you wish to edit.  Selecting the object type of either pipe or structure shows a list of all of these objects currently in the model of that type.

Find the objects that you want in the list and scroll look for the column for “Style”.  Simply click the field to assign and new style and that’s it!

About the Author

Civil Solutions Applications Expert<br><br>As a professionally licensed civil engineer Randy provides training, process optimization, and technical support in water resource and site designs. His involvements include a wide range of product types including AutoCAD, Civil 3D, Map 3D, Autodesk Storm and Sanitary Analysis, Raster Design, and Infraworks.

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