DX, DY, DZ
These fields are offsets (also called relative coordinates) in the three global X, Y and Z directions. They are measured from the previous node’s location.
Offsets are components of lengths of elements (exceptions are zero-length elements like a ball and a hinge joint). For example, the offsets for a 6 feet long pipe routed 30 degrees to global X-axis (in X-Y plane) are: DX=5.196 ft. (6 * cosine 30°), DY=3 ft. (6 * sine 30°).
If the element is in a skewed direction, then calculate the X, Y and the Z components (using basic trigonometry) and input them here or use the Slope command to have CAEPIPE calculate the components.
When you specify values for the DX, DY and DZ fields for a “From” element type row, they are treated as (absolute) coordinates of the node rather than (relative) offsets from the previous node. If the model begins at the global origin (0,0,0), you do not need to specify coordinates for the first “From” node. For any other “From” row with a previously defined node number, you do not need to enter coordinates either because CAEPIPE already knows the coordinates of this node (for example, node 30 on row 8 in the previous figure).
The offsets can be positive or negative, depending on the way you route your piping. When Length unit is selected as “ft’in” in CAEPIPE through Layout window > Options > Units then the offsets can be defined either in feet and inches or in feet and inches fractions. For example, 1’3” can be directly input as 1’3”. On the other hand, 0’11/16” can be input in CAEPIPE as 0’0-11/16”. Similarly, 1’3 ½” can be input in CAEPIPE as 1’3-1/2”.
Alternatively, you can also enter absolute coordinates of a Node directly in the layout by adding “*” following the “Node” number in the Node field instead of calculating DX, DY and DZ. For example, with 20* in the Node field, enter the absolute coordinates X, Y and Z of Node 20 under DX, DY and DZ columns.
The default number of decimals you can input for a length value is four. With an environment variable “INCREASE_DIGITS” set to “YES”, the number of digits you can input after the decimal can be increased to seven. This data can be printed other than to TXT and CSV formats.