Tekla Structures 2024 provides an efficient, direct export of drawings to the Microstation 2D DGN v8 format, which meets the requirements of bridge and other civil stakeholders.

The direct export to DGN helps to avoid the risk of data loss associated with the multi-step conversion from drawing to DWG and further to DGN.

The DGN is incorporated in the existing drawing export, and the drawing export dialog box now contains a new option to export 2D drawings in the DGN v8 format in addition to the existing DWG and DXF formats. The export is set up in a similar way as the existing drawing DWG/DXF export, however the template files are separate and some labels use format-specific terminology.

For details about the drawing export, see Export a drawing in 2D DWG, DXF, or DGN format.

Improvements and changes in the drawing export:

• The dialog box has a new title to include the DGN format: Export drawings as DWG/DXF/DGN.

• New file type DGN (V8) has been added.

• New tooltips guide the user through the setup.

• The selected export file type defines some of the labels, and the tooltips are adjusted respectively.

• In the DGN files, drawing blocks are called shared cells. In the new DGN export, the Ungroup objects in shared cells option exports all graphical objects as individual objects instead of shared cells.

  

• You can use a DGN seed file and configure the rules for mapping object elements to specific DGN levels.

• In the DGN export, the rules are configured on the Level rules tab. The Target levels from DGN option allows you to browse for a DGN template.

  

• You can also define whether the linework (color, line style, line weight) is taken from Tekla Structures settings or from the DGN template.

• In the DGN export, to draw drawing objects correctly in the coordinate space, select the check box in the Coordinate space column.

• The DGN file format is now included in Document manager in the common and default environments. If Document manager does not show the DGN files, you can add the file type in the DocumentManagerFileDocumentSettings.txt file located in your model, project, or firm folder.

  

• The BIM Publisher extension now supports DGN files.