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Creating Cross Sections in Surfer 10
Creating Cross Sections in Surfer 10
To start off, you must first have a grid file of your surface data and a .BLN file defining
the line of section. If you do not have a .BLN file, one can be digitized.
1. Click the File | New | Plot command to open a new plot window.
2. Click the Map | New | Contour Map command.
3. In the Open Grid dialog, select the grid file and click Open. A contour map is
created.
5. Click the Map | Digitize command. This allows you to click on the screen and record
the XY coordinates. Click once at each end of the section transect.
7. In the Save As dialog, specify a location to save the blanking file, enter the File
name, and select Boundary Files (*.bln) as the Save as type. Click the Save button to
save the blanking file.
8. Close the Digitized Coordinates window by clicking the X in the upper right of the
window.
3. In the Open dialog, select the .BLN file you created above and click Open.
3. For a cross section, the accumulated distance along the section will be the X axis
(currently located in column D). The Z value will be the Y axis of the cross section
(currently column C). The information currently in column A, B, and E are not
needed to create a cross section in this example.
4. Cut and paste Column D to Column A and Column C to Column B. Delete Column E.
1. Click the Column A header button to highlight column A. Click the Data | Statistics
command.
2. In the Statistics dialog, check the Number of values option in the Select items to
compute section. The other items to compute do not need to be checked.
3. Click the OK button and the Statistics Results dialog appears. The Number of values
is listed. Note your number.
5. To create a blanking file header row, an empty row needs to be inserted before the
data. Click the row 1 button to highlight the first row. Use the Edit | Insert command
to insert a blank row before the first data values.
8. In the Save As dialog enter the File Name. Select BLN Golden Software Blanking
(*.bln) as the Save as type. Click the Save button.
9. Click on the Plot 1 tab to go to the plot window where the contour map is located.
11. In the Import dialog, select the converted .BLN file and click Open. A base map of
the cross section is displayed. The base map scale needs to be adjusted to properly
view the cross section.
12. To change the scale of the map, click on the Map object that contains the base map in
the Object Manager to display the map properties.