Revit Design Adventures: Six Sheets in Six Days (18)

Day 1: Cover Sheet


As you can see, I made a very simple titleblock for this project. Also Included are a rendered image and a sheet list. Remember to leave room for it to grow as you add sheets. Next, we'll take a look at the floor plan which contains the existing and proposed layouts. 

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Wall Height Display and View Range

Notice the lineweights of the walls. The 2'-0" high one is in projection, the other two are being cut. This is referred to as 'low walls' behaviour. Any walls under 6'-0" display as shown. Harlan Brumm of the Revit Clinic blog and Autodesk support leader posted a good explanation of this here.

Revit Design Adventures: Order Out of Project Browser Chaos (17)

The image above shows the Project Browser from the kitchen renovation project.

The Revit Project Browser fills up with views very fast. The shear number of views can get overwhelming. Always name views as you make them. This is especially true of elevation and 3D views. 3D views are always the most popular because they are so descriptive. But if they are called something like 'Copy of 3D view 120' you will end up getting frustrated trying to find out what that view shows. This may even cause others to make lots of duplicate views.

Many firms make a Project Parameter (could be called Working or Sheet) that they apply to views. This text parameter is applied to views. It's purpose is to define whether a view is intended for 'working' or for 'sheet'. Using the Browser Organization tool under the Views tab, User Interface allows you to sort by the 'Working or Sheet' project parameter. 

Over the next six days we will be looking at all six of the sheets in the project. We will discuss mistakes made, lessons learned and big ideas for future projects.

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Point Cloud to BIM Workflow | Point Cloud Tools

Point Cloud to BIM Workflow Point Cloud Tools

Now that Revit imports Pointclouds I was interested in the basic workflow and found this post.

Revit 2012 What's New Highlights

This release is a nice upgrade from 2011. It focuses three areas; large team workflow, construction team integration and graphic display. These are what stand out for me...

Citrix Ready Version
We've been waiting for this one for a long time. Work on your Revit project from anywhere.


Worksharing
Now Worksets can be assigned colours. There is also a better worksharing monitor including some chat functions.


3D View Lock
Simple, long standing request.

Parts
The ability to break walls, floors and roofs into parts (but still connected to the host). Can be used for shop drawings, precast construction etc.


Material
Now we can save and share material configuration.

Graphic Display
This is a nice one. Mix and match Realistic, Hidden Lines, Ambient Occlusion, Shade.

Improved dwg export quality
Not exciting but needed.

Import Point Clouds
I can think of two large local jobs right now that could benefit from this.


Conceptual Analysis
This may just bring analysis into the mainstream.

For an in depth look at all of the new features check out this post from David Light's Revit blog.

Revit OpEd: RTC USA 2011 Registration is Open

Revit OpEd: RTC USA 2011 Registration is Open

Go to this if you can! Unfortunately because of a scheduling conflict I won't be able to make it this year. I am already planning for next!

Revit Design Adventures: The Construction Document Set (16)

Putting a construction document set together is not a one-time thing that you leave to the very end. Of course Revit manages a lot of this for but you it's an ongoing job. You can do a few things along the way to make the job easier at the end. In manual and AutoCAD drafting it's not uncommon to pick your scale, sheet size and titleblock first. This should also be done fairly early in the Revit workflow. Of course, you will not know all of the sheets and details that you will need but at least you have a good idea of your goals. If you 'Activate View' you can work right on the sheet. This is a good technique for sheets with multiple views because you can see an immediate impact with nearby views.

Views do not have borders. They have a Crop Region which doesn't print by default. Also, the Crop Region is always inside the datums. You will have to use Detail Lines on sheets to create the border. I decided not to make borders around my views in this project.

My second image above shows some highlighted break lines. These are an imported family. You can find these under Detail Components-Div01-General in the Default Imperial Library.

Creating a Sheet List schedule and placing it on your cover sheet is a big time saver. Remember to leave enough room for it to grow as you add sheets. There wasn't much risk of that with this small six-sheet set!

The Revit Project Browser fills up with views very fast. The shear number of views can get overwhelming. In the next post we'll discuss some good ways to keep the chaos at bay.

Previous Post in Series: Revit Design Adventures: Detailing in Revit (15)

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Revit Design Adventures: Detailing in Revit (15)

Back in 2006 I wrote a post on the subject of detailing in Revit and surprisingly most of it still holds true. Let's apply the methodology to the detail that we produced for this project.

There are some who claim Revit doesn't do detailing well. They are wrong in two areas:
1. Revit doesn't 'do' details, a person does. It seems obvious enough but just because you have the ability to cut sections through components doesn't mean that section will know the specific conditions that you need to communicate...
2. Revit does have a robust set of detailing tools that enable you to draw excellent details.

You need to ask the following question before you start detailing:
1. Should I model this in 3D, 2D or both?
These questions help you answer this:
a. Will this condition be visible from any other views?
b. Is this a generic detail that is used over different projects, or is it specific to this one only?
c. How far are we into the design, will this part of the building change drastically?
A good example is a door section.
Will you see the structural lintel and flashing from other views? No, draw it in 2D on top of the section/callout view.
What about the connection to the wall, insulation, frame extrusion shapes etc? Again, no. Draw it in 2D over top of the section/callout view.
Will I see the masonry lintel from another view? Yes. Model the lintel in the door family in 3D so it shows correctly in sections and elevations.
In the image above I have highlighted where I have used 2D detailing tools like 'Detail Components' or 'Filled Regions'.
If the door manufacturer has sent their own pre-engineered detail in AutoCAD just link (always link if possible) that file into a Drafting View and link it to a callout. Why 'reinvent the wheel'?!
I'm getting less and less comfortable with either linking or importing CAD. If time permits it's better to import the CAD into a blank Revit file, explode it, clean it, purge and then import that drafting view into your model.
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Revit Design Adventures: Phasing and Demolition Plans (14)

 
The final renderings of the third iteration helped the client to decide on what will be their ultimate direction. Which brings us to the forth iteration which will be more of a focus on construction documents, including details.

You should know that introducing Phases into a project is adding a level of complexity. It's not just a matter of putting some lines on a 'demo' layer. The process of using phases in Revit will force you to think very specifically about the demolition and construction process. Phases need to be setup and maintained right from the beginning of a project and throughout. By default everything is put onto the 'New' Construction' phase which we will discuss later.
In the case of our kitchen project there are only about ten things that need to be demolished. We started by identifying how many phases there would be and roughly what would be on them. You will need to go into the 'Manage-Phases' dialog box. Never use the 'New Construction' phase as this name creates all sorts of confusing scenarios if more Phases need to be added (think New, Newer, Newest...). You can simply combine the New Construction phase with another that you create. I propose simply naming them Phase 1,2,3 etc.
Now for the views. This is where you will spend most of your time with Phases. You will need to Duplicate (with Detailing) most of your main views and change the View Properties, Phase and Phase Filter to show the desired effect. Remember to name them with the Phase indicated. Having sheets set up early with the 'Phase views' on them can help streamline the process.

Of course, the Phasing property of the elements of the model needs to be defined. You do this by editing the 'Phase Created and Phase Demolished' properties.
Next, we want to start the detailing process...

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