Wall Wizard

The Wall Wizard can be used to quickly and automatically generate multiple wall segments with the wall height in each segment matching an excavation soil profile that you specify. The wizard consists of three steps:

1. Define the wall's plan geometry and the proposed ground elevations immediately behind the wall.
2. Define some constraints for the segment generation (e.g. embedment, how long each wall segment can be).
3. Review the automatically generated wall segments and fine-tune them.

Step 1. Define wall site geometry and soil elevation

In this step, you can enter data into a table that corresponds to the physical geometry of the wall and the elevation of soil behind it that it will cover:

• Plan X and Plan Y: the coordinates along the length of the wall when viewed top-down.
• Elevation, Top: the top elevation of the ground behind the wall which it will be required retain, at the given location in plan.
• Elevation, Bottom: the elevation of the ground in front of the wall, at the given location in plan.
• Import/Export: use this to save/restore the data in the table between projects.

To the right of this screen, you will see a preview of the plan layout of the wall and a flattened ("folded-out") elevation profile view showing the top and bottom soil elevations at each point.

Flip Backslope

Click Flip Backslope to flip the side of the wall that the backslope is drawn on.

Step 2. Wall Design Requirements

In this screen, you can define some constraints that will be used to generate the wall segments:

• Wall unit: select the wall unit that the wall will be built from. Note that if you wish to define a wall that has multiple different wall units then you can do so manually using the Add Wall feature.
• Minimum length of contiguous segments: defines the minimum co-linear length of the wall before a change to the number of layers in the wall can be introduced during the automatic generation of the wall segments. Note that for wall segments that are not co-linear, this constraint may not be possible to satisfy and in such cases will be ignored.
• Minimum embedment depth: the minimum depth below the bottom soil elevation that the wall layers will be generated to cover.
• Reference block (or basket) elevation: use this to set a datum on which the bottom or top face of some block will be placed. For example, if 123.2 m is inputted, then the block layers will be arranged so that the bottom of a block layer will be placed at exactly 123.2 m, and the rest of the layers will be stacked on top or below that block.
• Keep all blocks (or baskets) at the bottom layer at the same elevation: an optional constraint that will keep all of the blocks at the bottom layer of the wall to be placed at the same elevation throughout the entire length of the wall.
• Keep all blocks (or baskets) at the top layer at the same elevation: an optional constraint that will keep all of the blocks at the top layer of the wall to be placed at the same elevation throughout the entire length of the wall.
• Define courses setback: allows you to define a setback distance per layer of the wall, either directly (via Layer setback distance) or by defining a batter angle (via Batter angle).

Step 3. Review Generated Segments

In this screen, a preview of the automatically generated wall segments satisfying the constraints that you entered in the previous step will be shown.

Click on the wall segments to view the following edit options:

• Segment dimensions: displays the current height and width of the wall segment, as well as the number of wall units in each of these respective directions.
• Modify height: adds or a removes a single layer at either the top or bottom of the current wall segment. Note that any constraints you defined in the previous step will be overridden.
• Modify width (ends): extends or shrinks the current wall segment lengthwise relative to the adjacent wall segment on either side. This option is disabled if the adjacent segment is not collinear in plan with the current segment in the given direction.
• Split segment into half: splits the current wall segment into two equal segments
• Merge collinear segments: if you have selected two segments and they are both adjacent and collinear in plan, merges them and adopts the outermost top and bottom elevations.
• Reset All: click this to restore the entire wall layout to that which was originally generated upon entering this screen.

When you click Finish, the wall segments will be generated into the model as a new wall in the Segment Tree.

See Tutorial 2 - Multi-Segmental Wall for a step by step example of how use the Wall Wizard.