However there are to workarounds.
One of my favourite new features with Revit 2010 is the improvements to shared and project coordinates. Wes has put together a very useful tutorial on the AUGI forum here. With the visual coordinate points and the ability to move the project origin makes it a very powerful and easy to use tool.
Let’s look at all the opening tools and see how they behave differently.
Wall Opening Tool within a project file.
Can only be rectangular in shape.
Can put an opening in a Curtain Wall.
Can only cut one wall at a time.
Is not room bounding if the opening is at the computed height
Height is level based. – Move the level the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening is acceptable.
Can only be a perpendicular opening to the wall.
Copy / Monitors correctly but needs to be created in file the wall was originally created.
Opening using the Profile Tool
Can be any shape.
Can put an opening in Curtain Walls.
Can only cut one wall at a time.
Is not room bounding if the opening is at the computed height
Height is wall base offset based. – Move the wall base and the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening will cause the wall to be invalided and it will be deleted.
Can only be a perpendicular opening to the wall.
Copy / Monitors correctly – both ways
Opening using an In-place family opening tool.
Can be any shape
Cannot put an opening in Curtain Walls
Can only cut one wall at a time.
Is room bounding
Height is level based. – Move the level the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening is acceptable.
Can only be a perpendicular opening to the wall.
Copy / Monitors but needs to be created in file the wall was originally created in. In the copy file it simplifies the shape into a rectangle.
Opening using an In-place family void and cut geometry tool.
Can be any shape
Cannot put openings in Curtain Walls
Can cut multiple walls
Is room bounding
Height is level based. – Move the level the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening is acceptable.
Can be any shape or direction. Does not need to cut the entire wall.
Copy / Monitors but needs to be created in file the wall was originally created in. In the copy file it simplifies the shape into a rectangle and only cuts the first wall. Shapes that should be partly be cutting the wall will fully cut it.
Opening using an external rfa family file which is wall hosting using the family opening tool.
Can be any shape
Cannot put an opening in a Curtain Wall
Can only cut one wall at a time
Is room bounding
Height is level based. – Move the level the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening is acceptable.
Can only be a perpendicular opening to the wall.
Copy / Monitors correctly but needs to be created in file the wall was originally created in. In the copy file it simplifies the shape into a rectangle.
Opening using an external rfa family file which is wall hosting using the void and cut geometry tool.
Can be any shape
Cannot put an opening in a Curtain Wall
Can only cut one wall at a time
Is room bounding
Height is level based. – Move the level the opening will move.
Stretching the wall boundary inside the opening is acceptable.
Can be any shape or direction. Does not need to cut entire wall.
Copy / Monitors but needs to be created in file the wall was originally created in. In the copy it file simplifies the shape into a rectangle. Shapes that should be partly cutting the wall will be fully cut it.
One of our Sydney Users made me aware of this little Revit funny. It is in regard to using the Callout view tool in “Reference other view” mode. If the view you are trying to reference to, does not have its “Crop View” enabled on, it will not appear in the view list.
It does not affect Section or Elevation tag cross referencing, however if you are creating a Callout in the elevation or section the above applies.
This applies to Revit 2009 and 2010. I’m not sure if this is intentional, but it is a bit stressful for users trying to figure out why they cannot reference a particular view.
I user made me aware an item to watch out for when using the Revit revision system. A view which already contains a revision cloud on it was duplicated with detail. As the revision cloud was an older drawing issue the cloud was set to show none; and thus the users was not aware the revision cloud was also copied. When the view was put on a sheet, it was on its first revision before the drawing had been issued.
If this does happen, change the revision to show and delete the cloud in the copied view. Then change the older revision back to show none.
Personally I don’t think Revision clouds should be part of the duplicate with detail but I do understand why is happens.
It’s worth remembering that you can draw area boundary lines in an Area plan view. Delete the Area plan view and the Area boundary lines still remain (you just can’t see them). Revit considers Area Boundary lines as a type of model lines, but yet they are only visible in the specific type of Area plan they were created in. You could try recreating the area plan views but the easiest solution is just to delete them form the Warnings dialogue box.
On a side note: For some reason when you export the warnings of Area Boundary lines to the html file the export only calls them model lines, eg Model Lines : id 116854. Some bug in the export, as the warning dialogue box clearly calls them area boundary : model lines.
This is one of the few errors where Revit does not let you delete the element to fix the problem.
The error occurs when a curtain panel element which has been tagged; then is changed to a different category of panel. i.e. Door, Panel or Wall category panel. The common situation would be a tagged Door changed to a glazed panel.
Switching the panel back to what it was previously won’t fix the error. There is a few possible ways to fix the error but the following will solve the error every time even if the panel is in a curtain system.
In plan change the panel to a system panel. Select it and edit it. Select the panel again and delete it. The following error will appear: “Missing Curtain Panels will be replaced with System Panels to complete command.” Select “Replace Panel”. The new panel now won’t have any errors in it and you can now change it back to whatever panel it was before you started.
The slightly off axis is a warning that mystifies most users. What does it exactly mean and how do you fix it.
The error message is there to warn you when you may think something is drawn; horizontal, vertical or diagonal but really it’s not. In fact what you have drawn is 0.2 or less decimal degrees off horizontal, vertical or diagonal.
To fix it, make the element exact to the horizontal, vertical or diagonal axis or 0.201 degrees or greater off he horizontal, vertical or diagonal axis. Over a 100 meter distance this could be up to a maximum of 175mm out from what was originally drawn. (The line being rotated 0.1 degrees from the its start point.)
It’s up to you to determine what you believe can be “slightly off axis” in your project. In my experience 99% of the time this warning comes up, it can be corrected. For the time, you believe it is necessary to be “slightly off axis” you really should advise your team members. As I said in the previous post, when you have one element slightly off axis, it’s likely to lead to others, unless care is taken.
It’s a high rise apartment building in one of the trendy parts of town. The building it-self is relatively simple and the file is also relatively young, being only about 2 months old.
To my surprise there were 3500 warnings in the file. It made me aware very quickly that I need to spend some time with the users to educate them on how to fix warnings and the benefits of doing so.
I was determined to get the warnings down, as I don’t see how well our coordination with the Engineers would work, if the file at this early stage had so many error warnings.
It took me about 16 hours to get the 3500 warnings down to 2 warnings (It’s very satisfying to say that). For those interested the file size was 52MB before I started and at the end it was 5.5MB smaller. It sounds a lot but it was 3500 errors, so really the file size is not hugely affected by warnings unless you have several thousand of them. However the processing time is. The model seems to work very well now.
This is really a statement that you can eliminate 99% of error warnings, and it really doesn’t take too much time and effort (have a read of some of my posts on warnings posted in the past few weeks). Your model will work so much better, walls will join and trim properly, rooms will bound properly, you won’t have clashes with doors and walls, Ramps and Stairs will be the right length, Tags will work properly, Rooms, areas and doors won’t have duplicate numbers, Elements won’t be at odd angles to the axis planes, walls won’t clash and you won’t have two elements in the same place.
To me, that’s just the type of building we all want to build.
Let the warnings work for you, and not against you.
Some additional finds:
A group, filled region and masked region with an error won’t indicate the warning symbol in the options bar when selected. You need to be in the elements edit mode and select the sketch to see the warning symbol.
Use groups cleverly. Don’t create groups out of lines when they should have been a detail component in the first place. Ensure model groups are independent (ie you are not relying on elements outside the group to make elements in the group work). Disallow wall joins of walls in the group to walls outside the group. Review the warnings in the group before finishing the group mode.
Fix items that are slightly off axis straight away. As soon as you have one off axis, Revit will snap to it and soon you may find the first one is now joined by another 20 items slightly off axis.
To optimise the graphic settings go to: – Start / Control Panel / Performance Information and Tools / Adjust Visual Effects and set the Visual Effects to “Adjust for best performance”
If afterwards you need to change which worksets to open or closed you can do so, using the “Reload From” tool in Manage Links. Again use the drop down menu beside the Open button.
Another tip, if your file has worksets; set up a separate workset just for linked files. This allows users to close this workset easily without causing any other users difficulties.
Thus, if you are in a 3D view and you select by ID (inserting both ID numbers), you can then use “Temporary isolate element” and you will clearly see how the two items are clashing.
I also find it easier to go through Review Warnings plan by plan. Start with the ground floor plan view. Select everything in the view and go to the “Show Related Warnings” Icon in the options bar. Export the warnings list to an html file. Open the html file. Copy and past the ID numbers form the html file into the “Select by ID” tool and you will see and resolve the problems relatively quickly.
If you have warnings with area boundary or room boundary lines you are better off going to the view with the lines in it. For area boundary lines isolate the area boundary line category. For Room boundary lines and wall warnings isolate these two categories. After you do this using the select by ID will really speedup your warning resolution. Area lines over lapping has been some of our biggest culprit for generating warnings.
The key is to try to avoid asking Revit to show the warning. If it’s not easy to see it in the view you have open, its very slow to give you a new view, and most of the time the new view won’t help you much.
Also make sure you have you have a short cut for “Select by ID”
If you haven’t yet done some coordination between the Architect and Structural engineer in Revit here are some tips.
You can only copy monitor:
Copy / Monitor is a two way process. One of the parties will do the original creation of the category elements and the other will copping. Example: The Architect controls and creates the Levels and Grids, and the Engineer creates the structural walls, floors and columns.
The monitoring will work both ways, but there is slightly different privileges the users will have, depending on if they are the original creator or copier of the element. I say privileges in regard to work correctly within the copy / monitor workflow.
Original creator privileges:
Copy / Monitor Element user privileges:
So what does this mean?
Let’s say the Engineer creates a structural floor and the Architect copy / monitors it.
The Engineer can draw the floor, create openings in it using the shaft tool, change the type properties, and edit it’s sketch.
After copy / monitoring the floor the Architect can change it’s type, edit it’s sketch shape, move it, even edit the shaft openings the engineer has created, but if the Architect is to put an opening in the floor (using the shaft opening tool), it will not transfer correctly to the Engineers drawing.
Just remember you only copy monitor items both parties need to track. For a typical building I would suggest the following, but remember, you need to review this in detail before every project. All projects will be a little bit different.
Levels – Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Grids - Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Walls - Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Floors – Structural Engineer creates them –Architect Copy / Monitors them.
Columns – Structural Engineer creates them –Architect Copy / Monitors them.
Now it is taken that in the original Architectural model they will draw the floors and columns, but when the Engineer comes on board they are deleted and the copy / monitored from the engineers model.
Copy / Monitoring does take up a lot of processing power and memory so only copy / monitor what is really necessary, Share the process between both parties, Ensure your worksets are set up so the other party can unload the irrelevant categories using worksets, and lastly make sure your model not bogged down by bad maintenance of Review warnings.
We regularly hear keeping families basic is the way to go with larger projects. An example would be loose office furniture. From a documentation point of view, you don’t need 3d office furniture and creating a furniture family using model lines in plan should suffice.
What you may not know is that when creating call outs of the floor plan, if you end up using a “detail view” rather than a “floor plan” call out, you won’t be able to see your 2d family in the detail view. On moving the mouse over the missing item, you will notice it ghosting. To solve the problem you will need to change the view dept (far clip offset) to plus 1mm or more from what it is set to.
This is actually correct behaviour. For a detail view to display an item, its “far clip offset” needs to physically cut the item and not just touch it (1mm cut is enough). Floor plan views however behave differently. The far clip just needs to touch an item to see it.
If you are creating 2D model families and don’t want to change the far clip offset draw your model lines on a reference plane 1 mm above the “0 Reference level” in the family.
There are obviously a lot of graphic overrides in Revit. Just in regard to “line weights, line patterns and line colours” here is the ranks of what wins out the line overrides
Note:
Design options – to use the line work tool or override graphics in view by elements on items in design options, you must be in edit mode in the design option.
Try this:
Create a room space with 3 enclosing walls (no wall on the forth side).
Create a floor in the room using the “by line” method with the “pencil tool” or “pick line tool”.
Now grab the north wall and move it. Notice how the entire floor follows the wall move.
Try pinning the floor and move the same wall. The floor will still move.
It didn’t expect this kind of behaviour. However if the floor edge is not on the wall centre line or wall edge, you won’t get this behaviour.
In plan draw a wall.
Use the offset function and start to enter a number in the numeric data entry location.
Now move your mouse so the mouse courser enters into the drawing area.
Notice how the data entry flashing text courser in the numeric data entry area has moved to the start of the number.
This means that users often enter the wrong numeric data by accident. I personally believe a better functionality would be moving your mouse does not affect the data entry flashing courser.
Anyway: now you are aware of this issue, you know to not touch your mouse when entering data into the options bar.
Go to the Windows Run command (keyboard shortcut: Windows button + R)
Enter the command “charmap” and you will get the following dialog box:
Click on the desired character symbol and press “select”
You can now paste it into your text box in Revit or AutoCAD.
Back in the Character Map dialog box, you will notice when you select some symbols, in the bottom right corner, you will see the relevant keyboard symbol shortcut: Alt + ****. Ensure you are using the numeric keypad for the shortcuts (right numbered section of the keyboard and not the numbers across the top over the letters). The symbols I tend to use a lot:
° (degree symbol) = Alt + 0176
² (squared symbol) = Alt + 0178
³ (cubed symbol) = Alt + 0179
