Troubleshooting — Saving a DGN File to a DWG File

When I save a DGN file to DWG, the coordinates seem to shift — when I view the DWG file in V8, I get different coordinates than the DGN file.

AutoCAD is most likely displaying the coordinates with respect to the User Coordinate System (UCS), whereas MicroStation displays them in world coordinates. When saving to DWG, turn off Set UCS from ACS on the DWG/DXF Save As Options dialog box, and the coordinates should coincide.

When I save a DGN file containing compound MicroStation line styles to DWG, the lines that have special styles change to the Continuous line style.

DGN line styles that are not compatible with (understood by) AutoCAD default to the Continuous style when the file is saved to DWG. However, if the Drop Unsupported Line Styles option on the Save As DWG/DXF Options dialog box is used, complex MicroStation line styles maintain their appearance in the saved files. Although the elements appear the same, they actually are many small geometry components in series rather than one line with an assigned style.

When I save a DGN file that contains a default model and multiple additional models to DWG, a separate DWG file is created for each additional model.

AutoCAD only supports one model (model space) in each DWG file. When saving a DGN file to DWG, the default model is saved to model space and non-default design models are saved according to the setting for the Non-Default Design Models on the DWG/DXF Save As Options dialog box.

When this option is set to Create Separate Files, each non-default design model is saved to a separate DWG file. For example, suppose that design file "Test.dgn" has three design models: ModelA, ModelB and ModelC. When this option is on, the default model (Model A) and all sheet models are saved to "Test.dwg". The additional models are saved to "Test_Model.dwg" and "Test_ModelC.dwg".

When this option is set to Create Paper Space, each non-default design model is saved to a drawing layout (paper space) in the DWG model that contains the default design model.

When this option is set to Ignore , the non-default models are not saved to the DWG file.

When I save a DGN file to DWG, the DWG file displays levels that were not in the DGN file.

MicroStation allows level display to be controlled separately for each view, whereas AutoCAD only supports global layer settings. In the Save As DWG/DXF Options dialog box, set Level Display to the appropriate view.

When I save a DGN file to DWG, the geometry's symbology in the DWG file does not match what is displayed in the DGN file.

The mismatch may be caused by the Level Symbology setting. You can disable this view attribute in MicroStation to determine if it is affecting the display of the DGN file. The level symbology of the elements can be applied during save by using the Use Level Symbology Overrides setting in the Save As DWG/DXF Options dialog box.

When I save a DGN or DWG file, changes to references are not being saved.

The ability to save changes to reference file levels might be disabled for the DWG or DGN file. This setting is controlled by either of these key-in commands: DWG VISRETAIN <0 or 1> (AutoCAD key-in) or SET REFLEVELOVERRIDES <OFF or ON> (MicroStation key-in). If DWG VISRETAIN is set to 0 (or SET REFLEVELOVERRIDES OFF), then changes to reference file levels are retained only during the current session. If DWG VISRETAIN is set to 1 (or SET REFLEVELOVERRIDES ON), the reference levels changes are retained when the file is closed.