Coordinate system in Midas Civil

 Coordinate Systems 

Midas Civil provides 

• NCS (Node local Coordinate System) 
• UCS (User Coordinate System)
• GCS (Global Coordinate System)
• ECS (Element Coordinate System).

GCS is the basic coordinate system that is used to define the entire geometric shape of the structure. 

( X,Y,Z)

ECS is a coordinate system attributed to each element to reflect the element characteristics.

NCS is used to assign local boundary conditions or forced displacements in a specific direction to particular nodes linked to truss elements, tension-only elements, compression-only elements or beam elements.

UCS represents a coordinate system assigned additionally to GCS to simplify the modeling of complex shapes.(x,y,z)

The coordinates of the nodes, grids and mouse cursor relative to GCS and UCS are displayed in the Status Bar.

Example:
To start

1. Click X-Z in the Structure menu > UCS > X-Z.

2. Confirm “0,0,0” in the Origin field.

3. Confirm “0” in the Angle field.

4. Click ok

For easy modeling, point grid is set with 2 ft interval in UCS x-y plane.

1. Click Define Point Grid in the Structure Menu > Grid.

2. Enter “2,2” in the dx, dy field.

3. Click ok.