Navisworks 2024 – Customising a Section Plane

by Garry Stockton

By default, section planes are mapped to one of the six primary directions as follows:

• Plane 1 Top
• Plane 2 Bottom
• Plane 3 Front
• Plane 4 Back
• Plane 5 Left
• Plane 6 Right

You can select a different alignment for the current section plane. There are 6 fixed alignments and 3 custom alignments to choose from:

• Top  - aligns the current plane to the top of model.
• Bottom  - aligns the current plane to the bottom of model.
• Front  - aligns the current plane to the front of model.
• Back  - aligns the current plane to the back of model.
• Left  - aligns the current plane to the left of model.
• Right  - aligns the current plane to the right of model.
• Align To View  - aligns the current plane to the current viewpoint camera.
• Align To Surface  - enables you to pick a surface and place the current plane ‘on’ that surface, with its normal aligned to the normal of the triangle picked.
• Align To Line  - enables you to pick a line and place the current plane ‘on’ that line, at the point where you clicked, and aligned so that its normal is on the line itself, facing towards the camera.

You can easily customise a plane to a new view, to align a section plane to surface:

1. Click Sectioning Tools tab Mode panel Planes.
2. Click the Current Plane drop-down on the Planes Settings panel and select the plane you want to customise, for example, Plane 1. This plane becomes the current plane.
3. Click the Alignment drop-down on the Planes Settings panel and click Align to Surface. The cursor changes to a crosshair +.
4. In the Scene View, click somewhere on an object you want to align to. Navisworks updates the position and alignment of the section plane so that it is placed ‘on’ the surface of the selected object.
5. Optional: Click Sectioning Tools tab Save panel Save Viewpoint to save the current sectioned viewpoint.

Job Done.