MEP-BIM-Guru
Exploring Revit MEP in the real world...
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
Managing Revit Model Standards with Worksets & Usernames
Thursday, October 5, 2017
Structural BIM/Revit Specialist
Structural BIM/Revit Specialist
Wednesday, December 14, 2016
Monday, November 14, 2016
AU 2016
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Navisworks Compare Models
Monday, March 17, 2014
Double-Click Options
Monday, December 2, 2013
Revit Phasing & Rooms/Spaces
The Problem:
Each individual element in the model is assigned to a phase. This includes things like walls, doors, windows, ducts, pipes, equipment and rooms/spaces. On remodel projects you could have several phases depending on the scope. To keep it simple say there are three phases (Existing, Demo and New Construction). A problem arises when you try to get two separate room boundaries to show up on the Demo Plan. For example, say you have two rooms and demolish a wall between them to make a larger room. The rooms could be bound to the wall that is being demolished but this will only show on the existing phase view. I could not find a way to get the two separate rooms to show when the view phase was set to Demo. Since I need to show a Demo plan and New Construction plan this didn’t work. See example below.
Existing Phase View
Demo Phase View
New Construction Phase View
The Solution:
Demo Plans- The best way I found to get around this issue was to create a Room/Space Symbol Annotation Family. This symbol would be placed on a floor plan view in the Architectural model. The other disciplines would go to the visibility graphics of the demo view and set the Architectural link to ‘by linked view’ referencing the floor plan they set up with the symbols placed in each room.
New Construction Plans- There really isn’t a work around needed for this. Just make sure all the rooms/spaces in the model are on the New Construction phase and tag them like normal.
Conclusion:
I tried changing the phase filters several different ways and could not get the existing rooms to show in the demo plan. Unfortunately this workaround is a bit tedious since you will have to add the room symbols on the demo plans in addition to the rooms/space on the new construction plans. Creating a view with the room symbols in the Architecture model that the other disciplines can reference will save some time.
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Equipment Maintenance Clearance
Here is a quick how-to and a few lessons learned when adding a maintenance clearance to equipment families. Sometimes these are missing from families that a provided by manufacturers or even out of the box with Revit.
1. Open the family and go to the Ref. Level plan view
2. Plan out where the maintenance clearance needs to be. For this family it will be on the right side where the pipe connections are.
3. Create the extrusion as a rectangle in this area. Don’t worry about the size just make it to the right of the pipe connections.
4. Align the extrusion to the reference planes on three sides. Lock these to the reference planes by clicking on the ‘pad lock’ that appears after you align each side. See arrows below for the three sizes to align.
5. Create an ‘aligned dimension’ from the left side reference plane (that the extrusion is aligned to) to the right side of the extrusion. Make this extrusion the desired width and click on the dimension and lock it. See image below.
6. Open the front elevation view and align the extrusion to the reference plane at the reference level and the reference plane at the top of the box. Be sure to lock these like step 4 above. See image below.
7. Test that the extrusion flexes properly when you change to difference types
8. Open the 3D View and change the Visual Style to realistic. All extrusions will show shaded grey.
9. Navigate to the manage tap and click on Object Styles
10. Create a new Subcategory and name it ‘Maint Clearance’. Keep this naming convention as consistent as you can. See image below for the line color and pattern.
11. Click on Create New Material and name it ‘Maint Clearance’.
12. Click on the material portion of the Maint Clearance Subcategory. The Material Browser will appear. Click on Create New Material and name it ‘Maint Clearance’.
13. Click on the Asset Browser (see image below) to open the material templates.
14. Select the Maint Clearance material you created and then go to the Asset Browser and search for Amber. With the Maint Clearance material selected double click on the Clear Amber material and it should apply it to the Maint Clearance you created.
15. Change the color of the Maint Clearance material to Red. Click ok to go back to the 3D view.
16. Click on the extrusion you created for the maintenance clearance. While this is selected go to the properties and change the Subcategory to Maint Clearance. The extrusion should now appear transparent red with a dashed outline.
17. Depending on how you wish to see the maintenance clearance you can set the visibility in the Visibility Settings for the extrusion. For example if you don’t want to see this on your plans that are set to medium detail only check the extrusion to appear in fine detail. That way you see it in working views only which should be set to fine detail.
NOTE: A solid extrusion is required rather than a void if you are exporting to Navisworks. A void will not work with collision detection.