DIGITAL TERRAIN MODELS DTMs

The digital terrain model (dtm) is a major part of the surpac-working environment.
One way to describe a dtm is to compare it to a skin stretched over a skeleton. In the
case of surpac the skeletons bones are in fact the strings and points in a string (str) file.
By making a dtm of a string file surpac effectively creates a solid structure. This dtm
structure can then be manipulated to produce sections, contours, volumes or other uses.
Making a dtm is very simple in surpac. There are just a couple of basic rules that have
to be followed.
Create a dtm from a string file
When the form Create a dtm from a string file appears enter the file name you wish to
process. The dtm will be saved to this same name but will have .dtm at the end instead
of .str.

Use descriptions always leave this box ticked and the points in the dtm will have the
same description as the string file (this may be useful later)
Strings to act as break lines this means no triangles between points can be formed
that will cut across a string to another point / string. By ticking this option you can be
sure that crest, toe, boundary strings etc will be correctly represented once the dtm is
formed. It is normal that this box is always ticked.
Any spot height strings if they exit in the file - tick the box. Below you can enter the
spot height string range of the spot heights. The dtm then processes spot heights
differently treating them as individual points which means you can have one spot height
string for an entire pit or area. Be careful that strings that represent crests or toes are
not treated as spot heights. If they are, this will cause problems.

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Perform break line test - allows you to check to see if any strings are crossing each
other. If strings cross it means the data has not been drawn or edited properly. If they
do cross the coordinates of the problem area will be displayed and the dtm will not be
calculated. It is always a good idea to perform this test when you a processing an
important file for the final time eg: a volume file from which payments will be made or
a final design file that will later be mined.
Press Apply and the dtm will be formed.
You can now view the dtm in graphics by recalling the file and specifying the dtm
button instead of the string button.

When the dtm is displayed it will have solid colours and the wire frame (in blue) will be
displayed. The wire frame is the framework of triangles that have been formed.

To get a better view of the dtm switch the wire frame off

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and turn the light on

This form will appear when you switch the light on

Press Apply
If you want to see the strings as well then type ps(plot strings) or pl(plot lines)
The finished view will look similar to below
You can now rotate this view in any direction by holding down the left hand button of
the mouse this is useful to see if there are any obvious errors in the data. Big
differences in elevation would be shown by spikes either going up or down

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Contouring a DTM
You may now want to produce contours from the dtm. This is straightforward. Simply
go to the contouring option and select contour dtm file

Enter the dtm (name) to be contoured

You will be prompted with a form where you can enter the contour interval (or a range
of contours if you wish).

Once you have done this press apply and another form will appear.

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This asks you for the name of the contour file you want to create be careful to give it a
different name than the file you are processing or you will overwrite the original file!

For example if you were processing PIT111.DTM call the contour file PITCON111 a
new file called PITCON111.STR will now be produced that contains the contours.
If you wish you could produce plot annotations and an index contour file (for example
this could contain every 10m contour). If you dont want to produce these extra files
just leave this part of the form blank and press Apply. The new contour file will be
created.

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Producing a Volume from Two DTMs

To produce a correct volume from two dtms, both dtms will have to be the same size,
or one dtm will have to be wholly bigger than the other.

For example you may have some original topography this forms one dtm. You may
also have a pit survey this would form the second dtm. The second dtm has be totally
enclosed by the first, if there are any points in the pit survey outside the original
topography then the resulting volume calculation will be invalid or incorrect.
The second requirement is that you always use a boundary string to limit the calculation
to the area you are interested in. If you do not you will still get a volume figure but this
may be incorrect in many cases. In the example of the pit survey, the logical boundary
string would be the boundary of the excavated area. Always make sure the boundary
string is a closed string and is clockwise in its points sequence
Topo File

Pit Survey File

File containing extents (boundary) of data to be calculated

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Press Apply
Another form appears where you can enter the name of the note file (.not) that you wish
the calculation to be saved in. Surpac always assumes the name of the first dtm file,
you can change the name to something more suitable ie: pit1volmaret2002

Generally we do not save the results in a string file unless there is a special case so
untick this box
Press Apply
You will be prompted with two additional forms as the calculation progresses press
apply on all these and the calculation will be saved to a .not file similar to the one
below

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The upper dtm is displayed at the top along with the name of the boundary file and the
string number used
The second dtm is displayed next again with boundary file details
Below this the net surface-to-surface volume in cubic metres (m3) is displayed.
This is the volume between the two dtms inside the boundary string.
Finally the area of the boundary string is displayed this is good check to make sure the
right boundary has been used always check this string with the inquire/segment
properties function to ensure the closed string has the same internal area.
Note: This method always gives just the net volume. If there are areas of cut & fill that
have to be calculated then it is better to use the cut and fill between dtms option

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