Tools (like AutoCAD) that I wish Revit MEP had – Snapang

So, I know it’s been a while since I blogged, but work and family come first. Presently working 70-80 hours a week and attending to family issues have my time.

As I am working in Revit MEP (2012), I am faced with situations that in AutoCAD were quite easy to do, but are either non-existent or running through hoops (workarounds) to get it to work. So, I thought I’d  put out a quickie blog post on one of these. SNAPANG.

Let’s face it, our buildings are more and more becoming less  X-Y perpendicular to the page. What I mean is I’m working on a school project where there is a main section of the school that is horizontal to the page, but there are also spokes or appendages coming out from it. These wings are not perpendicular to the page. Laying out ducts and pipes when the view is not horizontal is a challenge to put it mildly. Yes, the snaps do work, but if I am modifying a wing due to the architect now changing that wing’s angle, it is almost like I want to erase everything and start afresh. That really is not practical wince the ductwork and piping are already drawn in.

If I was working on AutoCAD, it would be a non-issue – just type snapang and set the angle. When done, set it back. But Revit (as far as I can detect) does not offer anything like that. So what is one to do? What is the workaround?

Well, what *I* have done is extensive use of detail lines (DL) and then ALigning the duct to those detail lines. Yes, it is a drawn-out process, but yes, it does work. But the subject of this blog post is things that I wish Revit MEP had in it – this is one of them that would make life simpler.

If you know of another methods/workarounds that I most certainly may have overlooked, please respond! Thanks for viewing my blogs and thanks for the kind words of encouragement. It does help. 🙂

Want to (slightly) speed up Revit?

Here’s a quick tip that will shave off a few seconds for Revit.

• Right-click on the Revit icon on your desktop.

• Click on the Properties option on the right-click menu.

• From the Properties palette and in the Target box, go to the very end of that long sequence and add {spacebar}/nosplash. (please do not type {spacebar}, that is just my indication that you use the space bar) 🙂

• Click OK.

The nice splash screen that always stares you in the face when starting up Revit will disappear, thus saving you a few seconds on your load time.

NOTE: For you AutoCAD-ites, the same procedure above applies EXCEPT you add {spacebar}/nologo.

The case of the disappearing keynote

The case you are about to read is real, the names, and some specifics have changed to protect the unlearned.

The background on this peculiar case is this was an old Revit MEP 2010 project brought into Revit MEP 2012. The architect and owner decided to use the EXACT same plan for a new facility with the following exceptions:

• The building was mirrored
• The building was flipped

So, while it is the same building, things got interesting for us in the MEP world. Besides flipping of ducts, pipes, etc. we had to split the building into four areas to fit on the newer (smaller) title sheets  (that is a clue for later).

Everything was going along swimmingly, when we noticed that some of our keynote tags had nothing in them.

At first we thought that perhaps the keynote itself or keynote file got corrupted during the switch. this proved to be incorrect.

Clicking on the keynote and then looking at the Properties palette proved we weren’t going crazy.

So, our next thought was: let’s just delete the old one and add in a new one. So that is what we have done. But as you can see, it made no difference.

So, we go to thinking that perhaps since it was so close to the overlapping areas, that it might be confused as to which number to add since each area is a separate sheet.

EDIT: This will also occur if the item you are tagging with a keynote continues on another view, such as duct.

BINGO! That was the issue! So, what we did was to create a keynote further in the drawing, change the leader to be a free End, and then go on with life. Hope this may have helped solve this mystery.

My family cannot be found

A lot of my time is spent hunting for Revit families for things that the engineer specs. Sometimes the search is successful – many times it is not. Let’s get this truth out there on the table.

In a perfect world, I could just go and pick ANY item the engineer specs and find it within  few clicks. Let’s get that thought immediately out of our heads. Unless your firm has already used that family type AND saved it out to a common shared drive, you are pretty much out of luck. IF you have a Revit family guru on staff that can quickly make the family with all its intricate connection and constraints (we are lucky to have several in our firm – I am but a humble wannabe), then your job is made a bit easier.

But what if you just wanted to SHOW some representation of a unit? It doesn’t have to so super detailed that it includes the nameplate of the manufacturer on it. You shouldn’t EVER need that level of detail, but I’ll let that one go and get to the gist of what I’m blogging about. Revit MEP has a wonderful tool for us family builder wannabe’s. It is called “Model in Place”. And it is pretty straightforward for a long-time AutoCAD user like myself. Many of the commands work very similar to AutoCAD! 🙂

So let’s get it. The engineer has provided me with this cut sheet and wants to use this unit.

We can model this! First, let get some views set up so we can see how our model is progressing.

The Model in-place tool can be found in the Systems Tab (I’m using MEP 2013 for this example) and model panel.

Clicking on the Tool brings up the Family Category and Parameters dialog box. This is just asking you what TYPE of family you want to create. And when you are finished, it will do the housekeeping and add it in the appropriate place. In this example, we are modeling (in place) a piece of Mechanical Equipment.

Now it asks you to name the family. In this case, we are going to call it York MAU 7T.

On the Create Tab and Forms Panel, select the Extrusion tool. In my haste, I forgot to copy the ‘A’ dimension that sets the height of the unit. In our example here, we will use 64.375″ The easiest way I have found to use the extrusion tool is in conjunction with the Properties Palette. In our simplified example, we want to start the extrusion at zero and end it at 64.375″. We can now start drawing the width and depth of the unit based off the cut sheet. We start by picking a start point and  typing in 31.758″ (don’t forget the ” symbol, or you will have drawn a line at 31.758 FEET). The Depth of the unit 58.5″. continue drawing the unit and snap back to the beginning line drawn. This will ensure that it is closed.

 

Click the green check mark tool in the Mode Panel. This ends the Extrusion tool. Take a moment and admire your work thus far. Yeah, it’s a cube, but we MODELED it! 😉

Let’s embellish it a bit before calling this simple exercise done. We’ll add the rants on the top to give it a bit more visual appeal. Back to the Create Tab and Forms Panel, select the Extrusion Tool again. This time from the Draw Panel, select the circle tool. Our Circle extrusion will sit on the top of the box, so the extrusion start will be the 64.375″ . We just want to show a hint of what the fans are at the top, so the extrusion end will be 2″ above that (66.375″). Draw one circle and end the extrusion. Pick the extruded circle just drawn and from the Modify Panel, select the Copy Tool. You can further embellish your model by adding some plain circles to indicate the fan grille. And you can also show lines to indicate the front opening. To show the front  opening, I used the Void Forms > Void Extrusion. It’s all up to you how much you want to make this thing look.

Finally, from the Create Tab and In-Place Editor Panel, select the Finish Model Tool. Your model is complete! The Model-in-pace tool can be invaluable if you absolutely need to show that equipment but don’t have the time to go into an in-depth model. Remember, that if you are connecting other things to this model (pipes, ducts, etc.) there are NO connection points! This is one downfall of this tool. But I can live with that. Hope this helps. And if you have other suggestions for improvements on this subject, please let me know.

Tagging Rooms all at once

When you use a model in your MEP drawing from an Architectural link, chances are there are room names associated with it. And we really do want to see those room names in our model too.

So, it took me a bit of playing around to figure this out (remember, I am a Revit newbie). At first, I saw the Room Tag (RT for typers) tool in the Annotate tab.

This is fine, but it only does one room at a time. We could do that, but we are trying to be productive. So how does one get all the room names in on a view at one time? The secret involves the tool called Tag All. Actually, if you hover over the tool name, you get a better feel for what this tool actually does (Tag All Not Tagged).

 

So, by bringing up the Tag All tool, you get a dialog which might look confusing at first. Three are a slew of categories (based on what is in your model, how you set your template up, etc.) and their associated tags.

We are interested in this post for room tags. Drill down through the list until you see the Room Tags category. In our example, we have two different room tags available. We only want the room name to appear, so we’ll choose just the room Tag loaded tag.

There are some options for creating these room tags, such as creating a leader and orientation. There is one very important item we need to check here before proceeding. The check box that says ‘Include elements from linked files’ must be checked. We are grabbing the room names from our linked Architectural model.

Click OK, annnnnnnnnnnd………… nothing happens! 🙂

Alright, I lead you on. There is one important step you must do. In order for this to work, you must have the crop region visible. Toggle the Crop region so that it is on and then try the Tag All tool  again.

Ahhh, much better! With the Tag all tool, we have only performed a small portion of what this tool can do to help simplify and streamline annotation for you. Hope this tidbit helped.

 

 

 

Revit commands – ALIGN

I’m going to start posting some of my favorite (and least favorite) Revit MEP commands and tools that either AutoCAD doesn’t have or has but is different. This installment is on the Revit MEP ALIGN command.

In the example above, I have 2 rectangular ducts that I wish to put them on the same plane or elevation. You can find the Align tool in the Modify tab, or simply type AL (remember, no return key here).

The first prompt is: Please select line or point reference for alignment. This is simply asking you to select the first object that the second will be aligned to.

The next prompt is: Please select an entity to align (it will move into alignment with the reference). Can’t explain that one any clearer. 😉That’s basically it! Type AL, 2 clicks – done! Well, almost. Looks CAN be deceiving. Lets cut a section and see what the problem is:

You can see that while the ducts are lined up in one view, they are not in another. If you were to join those two ducts together in that view, you would end up with some weird transition, or perhaps it wouldn’t allow the connection at all. These are things to keep any eye out for when you are aligning.

to fix this, just run the ALign command again on the other view. Note that aligning rectangular ducts or equipment, you can (most of the time) align using the edges of the duct or equipment. When working with round duct or pipes, the connection point will always be to the center. A wishlist for me would be that there would be an option to allow it to align in all views to the same planes.

The AutoCAD equivalent for doing the same things is the move with osnap set to near or endpoint. You CAN use the Revit Move command, but this just seems to work better, in my opinion. And the AutoCAD Align command really has nothing in common with the Revit Align command – go figure.  See you next time with

New Project Setup – our way

I am writing this blog entry more as a step-by-step tutorial for myself. The methods here may not match your company standards, so caveat emptor. This is in response to my recent ‘baptism by fire’ into project setup. My first one took what I thought was an extraordinary amount of time to set everything up and I needed make sure that I documented the steps somewhere, so this it. I will list the step-by-step instructions on how WE set up a new project. You can follow along if you like 😉

Architectural Revit Model

It all starts here. We base our project sheet layout basically like the architect as they are the ones we need to please in order to get more work. They (and I agree) like to see consistency throughout the finished project sheets.

1. Open the Architectural model from the received folder. Ensure that the Worksharing ‘Detach from Central’ is CHECKED.
2. Print all the Architectural Sheets for later use.
3. From the Manage tab, click the Manage Links tool. Click through the tabs and delete any entries. Click OK
4. Still in the Manage tab, click the Purge Unused tool. Click OK.
5. From the Revit ‘R’, click SaveAs > Project. Navigate to the 01_CADD\BIM\Models folder. The naming convention we use is: ProjNo_v12_ArchName_Mech. the v12 shows that the project is in Revit MEP version12. Replace the existing model if prompted to do so.
6. Close the Architectural model.

The Architectural Model is now ready to be used. Note: The above steps also apply for when the Architect updates their Revit Model. This will also apply to other disciplines (Structural, Electrical).

New Project Creation – Linked

Now we will take the newly imported model and use it in our new project.

1. From the Revit ‘R’, click New > Project.
2. In the New Project Dialog, make sure the Template file is pointing to the correct place (It should be set as default). Click OK
3. From the Insert tab, click Link Revit. Navigate to the newly created Architectural model as we did above.
4. Ensure the positioning is set to ‘Auto – Origin to Origin’ and click the Open button.

The architectural drawing is now linked into your new project.

New Project Creation – Copy/Monitor

We want to create a section so that we can Copy/Monitor the Architectural levels.

1. Open a typical Architectural Elevation. If there is none, go ahead and create a section through the architectural building so you can see the established levels.
2. From the Collaborate tab, select the down arrow next to Copy/Monitor and select ‘Select Link’.
3. Pick an Architectural level to activate the tool.
4. From the Copy/Monitor contextual tab, select Copy, and then select the Multiple check box.
5. CTRL-Click the Levels you wish to Copy/Monitor. Then click the SMALL finish button (next to the Multiple check box).
6. Re-select the Copy/Monitor contextual tab (this seems redundant, but I guess that’s how Revit MEP works), and click the Finish tool (the one with the green check mark)

You have now Copy/Monitored the linked Architectural sections. The advantage of this step is that if the Architect happens to make a change in elevations, it will automatically be reflected on our MEP drawings when we get the updated model.

New Project Creation – Cleanup/Creation

This is (in my opinion), the most tedious part of this whole process. We are going to drill through the linked Architectural model and get rid of things that we, as MEP don’t care to see; things such as their notes, symbols, legend, sections, etc. we the are setting up views to match the Architectural plans (remember, entire project consistency is the key here).

1. We have to have at least one Architectural floor plan, so don’t get too delete-happy. 😉
2. Delete all sections, elevations, schedules, notes, legends.
3. Delete all but ONE sheet. We will need the title block for later steps.
4. Open the Architectural Level 1 Floor Plan.
5. Right-click on the name in the Project Browser and apply the view template. In this case, It will become a Level 1 Mechanical Plan (HVAC, Mechanical Piping). Compare the scale to that of the Architectural and adjust accordingly.
6. Enable the Show Crop Region and adjust the region so that it is similar to the architectural plans (the ones that we printed out earlier).
7. Hide the crop region.
8. Repeat steps 4 – 7 for all other plans that you anticipate you will need (such as Demolition, Plumbing, Fire Protection, etc.). Set the view template accordingly too.

Sheet Setup

Now, we are going to set up our sheets (what will be printed). Here , it is very important (for our firm) to have the plan sheets, no matter if they are Architectural, Electrical – what have you; all look the same – that is, the same plan view show in the similar location on the sheets.

1. Open up the Architectural Sheet family. We need to add our logo to the sheet and make it a Mechanical sheet.
2. Navigate to the location where the logo is and drag the family onto the architectural sheet family.
3. Load the Architectural sheet family back into the project, overwriting any settings (we want our logo to be a “permanent” part of the sheet. It may prompt you where to save the project if you have multiple projects open.
4. Back to our sheet that was brought in via the template, We will bring in all the information that the Architect has set up on the sheet; such as Name, Address, etc. On the Manage tab, select the ‘Transfer Project Standards’ tool.
5. In the Select Items To Copy dialog, click the Check None button. this clears all of the entries. We are only interested in a few of them.
6. Click the Phase settings, Project Info, Viewport Types check boxes and click OK.
7. From the Plans created on the Project Browser, click on the corresponding Plan and drag it into the sheet. Line up similar to the way Architectural has their sheet set up.
8. Repeat for all other sheets.

That is basically how we set up our new projects. As I mentioned from the beginning, you methodology/standards may vary. If you suggestions that might streamline the process, or any comments in general, I welcome them. If you’ve made it this far in reading, I thank you. 🙂

Triskaidekaphobia?

Triskaidekaphobia – the fear of 13. you may not have heard of the word, but are probably familiar with famous movies surrounding this. Movies such as the Friday the 13th series and 13 Ghosts, just to name a few. Even most public buildings avoid floor 13 on high-rise buildings. It’s just bad luck.

This week, Autodesk OFFICIALLY announced and showcased some features of its new Revit MEP 2013. I’m sorry, but every time I hear of 13-anything on software, I am transported back in time to the year 1996; when Autodesk released their ill-fated AutoCAD release 13. So, when I heard that Autodesk was calling their newest releases 2013, part of me was stuck with horror that it might be as ill-fated as the AutoCAD 13 was. In all fairness, AutoCAD release 13 was actually AC1009. 🙂

There have been many good blog posts on the new features of Revit MEP 2013, and since I have no real hands-on experience with it, I cannot rightfully say whether it is good or bad or meh.

But some of the highlights of the new release include:

• ASHRAE Duct fitting catalog integration
• Photo-realistic views
• Duct/Pipe Pressure and flow calculations
• Bentley import/export
• Enhancements with Revit Server
• Revit Exchange App Store

Sounds like a nice roundup of features. I hope that work will be getting the release so I can play with it first-hand. It is probably way early in the release, but let’s hope that we don’t have a recurring Triskaidekaphobia.

It’s so good that its bad

Continuing from my previous post (well, along the same thought lines), I have come to the conclusion that Revit MEP is so good that it can actually be bad! Let me explain.

With Revit MEP, I can design ductwork with its insulation, and while coordinating with structural and architectural, I see that the duct is banging right through a joist. It is at this point that I need to make a value determination; do I fix it or let it go through? Let’s look at both:

Fix it
I need to get the duct through the space given me from the architectural plans and the structural. Oh, we can’t forget about electrical and their lights and cable trays. If the duct is a large duct carrying lots of cfm, then I really have to worry how to get that darn duct through the maze presented to me. One choice would be to throw it back to the architect and tell them that they need to give me more space. This might mean raising the roof, or lowering the ceilings. None of which the architects (in my experience) cherish doing. 🙂 We can go to the structural engineer and tell them they need to give me more room, which means they have to spend more time re-designing and evaluating. Rarely, have I seen structural engineers willing to make their steel members shorter. I mean in both the architects, and structural  engineers minds, they are designing for certain criteria; whether it be photo metrics or the clients desired ceiling heights. And the steel is sized to make sure the building doesn’t fall down when they get that record 3 feet of wet snow on top of their roof. I get it. So, we all are pretty stubborn in our minds. 🙂 And we absolutely cannot forget the biggest factor that prevails: we all have a budget and time allotted towards the project. And it is our common goal to come away from this project with a profit. If that were not so, I would no longer exist in my company because they could not afford to keep me. So, lets talk about if the duct is a small little thing and I am presented with the same issues, the solution would be easier in my mind – let it go.

Let it go
I know we all glory and revel in the wondrous achievement of BIM and Revit, and love to spin that 3D model around to see our handiwork. C’mon, admit it you DO like that! 🙂 But sometimes if it s a small issue, like the smaller duct, then I feel that we leave that judgement to the contractor. After all, the endgame of our design is a 2D REPRESENTATION OF OUR INTENT. We all know that in most cases, the contractor is going to look at our plans, roll them up and put it up the way that they feel that will make their process shorter. The drawings and the engineers stamp indicate that we have a set of plans that we present and that they are there to show the contractor that this is the route we want the duct to go. The more important things for the contractor (where they WILL take a closer look), is the equipment, controls, and balancing requirements. If you are lucky to have a competent contractor that you have worked with before on project, then the project flow is almost zen-like. They know the intent. They have done this kind of work before and there will be very few RFI’s. I know, I’m speaking about the ideal situation. But let’s get serious. The bottom line is that everybody is doing their thing to make money. So if Lowbid Contractor gets the job and you have not worked with them before, then your drawings have to spell out all the p’s and q’s otherwise you will be nickel and dimed for every change. So back to Revit. Sometimes, letting it go is easier on you and your company but COULD come back to bite you later.

Pipe Blobs
So, another scenario where Revit is so good that it is bad is in pipes. I am amused at the various tutorials showing all your pipes doubled up on a rack in real sizes, real spacing. umm, have you even tried to plot that out on your 1/8″ = 1′-0″ plan? Do you also get a large black blob on your screen where all those pipes are? So, we have to go back to the ‘old school’ CAD drafting and space all the piping out so that when it is plotted one can clearly see the pipes. Yes, one could cut all kinds of sections to show the intended pipe configuration (and it is desirable to do that). But Revit is so good at what it does that it slows you down in that aspect. Think about a pump room and the all the suction and return piping in the pump room. If you designed your piping the way that it actually WANTS to look, on a plan (even a large-scale plan, it will be totally unreadable/un-understood. The bottom line in this case is that one would have to design multiple view sections of the pump room to clearly show the intent. Once again, the goal is to produce a set of 2D plans to the contractor to show them the desired layout scheme.

Home-Run, baby!
I stole that line from a co-worker. 🙂 We are experimenting with an idea that we borrowed from electrical, that should meet all the demands  of the above mentioned. Here it is: For congested areas, such as lavatories and situations where we need to run hydronic supply and return to VAV boxes, we simply – home run it. We run the main pipes to the particular rooms and stop there. We give a detail of a common layout. We keynote all the equipment. We provide a schedule for the keynoted items with the required pipe sizes. DONE! What does this do? It saves US time. We no longer have to run that 3/4″ water line all around to each fixture. We have to give all the information to the contractor to FIGURE IT OUT FOR THEMSELVES. We don’t need (or shouldn’t need) to hold their hands on the exact routing of the VAV hydronic piping.

We are trying this process out, and hope that the authors will smile upon this and that the architects won’t be tho upset that we didn’t show every tiny little pipe, fitting, valve, etc. We feel it is a win situation, and unlike the architect that must show the clocks models on the walls, blackboards, etc. We don’t need to go to that level of detail UNLESS the client wants a super-cool 3D model where they can virtually go in each room, above the ceiling, in pipe chases to see everything. If that is the case, then we will need to discuss more money! 🙂

Let me know how your company deals with these situations and perhaps we can collectively help each other out. Hope this long dissertation was of a benefit.

Annotating Duct Sizes – Really!

After completing my first project in MEP 2012, I now have a little “free time” before the next deadline hits. This blog post is about duct sizing. No, not the Revit MEP automatic sizing, rather the good old fashioned duct sizing using your favorite duct wheel, or app (yes, there are MANY apps for that).

I don’t know about other firms, but our firm likes to annotate the actual duct opening; as in the size that the required CFM is needed. When you draw ducts and give it a size, it faithfully draws the duct to the size you specified.

Our little hypothetical duct has an initial requirement of 2400 cfm. Using our handy duct sizer, we confirm that a 30″ x 14″ duct will do it nicely for us. The problem lies that we want to abate some noise from this duct, so we line it with 1″ of duct liner. So now, our actual free space for air to travel is reduced: 30″ – 1″ – 1″ = 28″. And 14″ = 1″ – 1″ = 12″. Using our duct sizer, we now see that the free area is about 1925 cfm! So, we would oversize the duct to make allowance for the duct liner. (32″ x 16″).

Now to the crux of this blog. When we add duct liner, it shows it as shown below.

Now we resize the duct to make allowances for the duct liner.

What we ACTUALLY want to see is the duct free space (30″ x 14″). In order to get this, we need to dig a little deeper into Revit MEP. We will first make a copy of the family (so we don’t destroy the original) and then will modify a parameter or two:

• Click on the duct label.
• From the Modify | Duct Tags ribbon, select the Edit Family tool.

• Your screen will change and you will see a large SIZE on your screen. You are now in the editor. So, the first thing we want to do is MAKE A COPY. From the R on the upper left of your screen, go to Save As > Family.

• Call the file whatever makes sense to you. I called mine “Duct Size Free Area Tag”.
• Click on the large SIZE in your editor and select Edit Label. The Edit Label dialog box will appear

• Notice on the right-hand side, you see the parameter called SIZE, but also take not on the left-hand side of the dialog box in the long list of category parameters, you see a parameter called FREE SIZE. This is the one we want to use!

• We want to replace the SIZE parameter with the FREE SIZE parameter. Click on the FREE SIZE parameter on the left-hand side and use the right arrow tool to transfer it to the right-hand side.

• Now select the SIZE parameter on the right-hand size and transfer back over to the left-hand side using the left arrow tool. You will be left with just the FREE SIZE parameter on the right-hand side. This is want we want! Click OK.
• So, we now have a big FREE SIZE label on our screen.
• Click the Load into Project tool on the ribbon.

 

• In the Load into Projects dialog, select the project that you want the new label to be loaded into. In this case, it is our only project. Click OK to dismiss that dialog.

 

• Your duct now indicates that it is a 32″ x 16″ duct, but the annotation indicates that it is a 30″ x 14″ duct. That is what we wanted to accomplish.

As I mentioned at the beginning, this is how our firm does it. Your firm may be different. Hope this helped someone out there. If for nothing, I now have it documented should I need to recreate that family again. 🙂