The Mystery of Randomly Missing Profile Grade Lines When Publishing
Issue: A large plan set with dozens of profiles occasionally prints without grade lines on random sheets — and which ones fail changes every time.
Cause: Civil 3D stores profile view geometry and labels in the drawing, but the graphics pipeline can “skip” linework under memory pressure or when regen data is stale. The issue tends to show up in big projects with many profiles and large xrefs.
Solution:
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Step 1: Force Rebuild – Use REGENALL, then SAVE and re-publish.
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Step 2: Optimize Drawing – Purge unused styles, audit, and clear LAYDEL ghost layers. Large drawings with thousands of objects are more prone to skipping graphics.
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Step 3: Break the Plan Set – Publish half the sheets at a time to see if memory limits are the culprit.
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Step 4: Reset View Caches – Select each profile view and use Rebuild from the ribbon. This forces Civil 3D to regenerate the profile geometry.
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Step 5: Update Drivers – Ensure your GPU driver is Autodesk-certified and hardware acceleration is on.
Pro tip: If you must deliver quickly, use EXPORTPDF instead of PUBLISH — it uses a different graphics pipeline and is less likely to drop lines.
