Converting AutoCAD Details to Revit

Details are a vital part of the documentation process for building design and construction projects.  CAD users who have used AutoCAD for years have typically developed a large detail library, or at least possess many details used on previous AutoCAD projects.  Those details are valuable as a lot of time and knowledge has gone into developing them.  It is important to be able to access those details for usage within Revit.

While there are various methods utilized for re-using AutoCAD details, not all of them are good solutions and some can add corruption to your Revit project file and create problems.

Residential Door Tag in Revit

Specifying information concerning doors on architectural plans is an important aspect of conveying information to the contractor working in the field.  Residential designers and commercial designers tend to have different approaches to this situation as commercial projects generally utilize a door schedule referencing a number tag at the door and residential projects generally have the door size shown directly on the floor plan.  While it seems like a door size tag for residential projects would be a basic feature in Revit, there are no default tags to display the door size in typical methods.  In this article, we will take a look at a process to create a typical residential door tag.  This process can then be modified slightly to create other variations of the door size tag and also window size tags. 

Public Entities Requiring BIM and have Standards

The AEC industry is seeing more clients requiring Building Information Modeling (BIM) on projects.  Some clients have very detailed standards and expectations for the BIM process, and some clients say that they want BIM but have not idea what they really desire or how to get BIM.  And then, there are clients that fall somewhere between those two types.  Many clients (especially in the private sector) that have BIM standards in place have not publicized their standards, but will provide it to the design/construction team for specific projects.  However, there are public entitites that have established BIM standards and have posted those standards on the internet and are accessible to anyone with internet access.  Since it is nice to reference those BIM standards, I thought that I would list various public entities which have BIM standards that you can reference.

What Happened in the Design Software World in 2012

It is now the last day of 2012 and I am looking back over the past year and considering what has happened in my world of design software.  Working so closely with the software, it is sometimes easy to forget how much has changed or occurred in the past year.  Technology and software continually changes so it is never boring keeping up with it.  Since I am an architect in the United States who deals with Autodesk software, that will be the focus of the article.

Autodesk University 2012

Autodesk University 2012 is just over 5 weeks away at this point and I thought that I would just write a few comments about it for those going to it or considering going to it.  If you are a user or manager of an Autodesk product, I highly recommend that you attend this annual conference which will be held in Las Vegas November 27-29, 2012 at Mandalay Bay.

Easily Print Selected Area in Revit

There are many times that you want to print just a specific area inside Revit and at a specific scale.  In AutoCAD, you have the option to print a window and set the scale in the print window, but that option does not exist in Revit.  That is very annoying to AutoCAD users moving to Revit.  However, there is an easy way to accomplish the same thing with Revit without much effort.

Room Occupancy Load Tag in Revit View

As an Architect, I find it helpful to be able to look at a floor plan and see the occupancy load for each room, and some building permit reviewers require this information be shown on the plan.  My previous blog article addressed creating a schedule in Revit to show occupancy loads for rooms.  This article will take off from that point and desmonstrate how to create a room tag to place on a floor plan view that shows the occupancy load of the room.

Show Room Occupancy Loads in Revit Schedule

Working with building codes is an important aspect of working as an Architect during the design stages of a project, and knowing the occupancy of each room is a key component to that.  This article will demonstrate how to create a Revit schedule that shows the occupancy load for each room in your BIM file.  It will use a key schedule as the source of information for calculating loads, so this article will address creating that key schedule as well.

Hiding Revit Family Parameters in a Project

In the various Revit software packages, it is possible to hide family parameters so that they are not visible in the family’s properties when in a project file.  This is often desirable for situations where the family creator does not want the user to even know that the parameter exists within the Revit family.  This can be helpful for keeping the parameter from being easily modified or just keeping the parameter area less confusing.  Parameters that are used strictly for calculation purposes are an example of parameters that may be hidden.  Parameters that are used behind the scenes to control visibility of objects based upon other criteria is another example of parameters that may be hidden.

Templates Provided with Revit 2013

In October of 2011, I wrote an article on the templates that were provided with the various Autodesk Revit 2012 products.  (Link to article) Autodesk made some changes to what templates are provided with the Revit 2013 products, so I thought it good to mention those changes.  I like the changes that were made and the provided templates make more sense with the 2013 release.

Sharing Autodesk Materials Throughout An Organization

Autodesk 2013 products allow you to create a library that contains the most commonly used and standard materials within an organization.  It can be daunting and confusing to users when they go to specify a material for something and there are many materials from which to choose.  Autodesk provides many materials Out-Of-The-Box (OOTB), companies will develop materials in-house, and materials may be downloaded, all of which creates a large collection of materials.  This article will describe how you can create a central library on the company server in 3 easy steps, from which users can select the preferred material.

Revit MEP Connectors – Misc Information

MEP Connectors are a very important aspect to the effective usage of Autodesk Revit MEP software.  The MEP Connectors, which are attached to Revit families, contain important information that is utilized for design and connectivity features of Revit MEP.  They are utilized to connect ductwork, piping, electrical, etc to a family and have many connector-type specific settings and characteristics.  This article addresses many miscellaneous aspects of MEP Connectors which are helpful to be aware of.