Nurns Curves in revit !?

[Jay North]

Hi folks, this is my first post here on the forums. I'm hoping someone out there has come across this problem before!

I have some nurbs curves created in Rhino and exported to dwg then linked into my Revit project.
The curves represent CHS chords of a truss in a bridge and they bend in elevation & plan. I have concluded that I can't model these with structural framing so went for the conceptual mass approach. Having created in place mass families using 3d spline to snap to nodes along the curve, it was possible to then use the edge of the mass to create a sweep with a tube profile.

The problem is this only approximates the nurbs curve, and also is time consuming. Also have trouble representing the chords in coarse view so they represent as single lines not double.

It seems Revit 3d tools are not well equipped to deal with this sort of geometry. Does anyone have any experience or workflows that may help?

3d view of part of the bridge attached for info

Cheers

[Dimitri Harvalias]

Have you looked at adaptive component families for this?
If you create the Rhino geometry and apply a mesh grid to it prior to export that will supply you with nodes you can snap the adaptive component to.
Don't own a copy of Rhino but have worked with people who've had some success with his approach.

[m20roxxers]

Can you develop the profiles in rhino and save out the geometry into Revit families and place them???

Is geometry more accurate this way might be worth testing.

Unless you are planning to manipulate the geometry in Revit but I would say rhino would be better to manipulate the shape.

[FOUTJM]

Adaptive components is probably the best way to go for this. although it will still be difficult.
interesting project. good luck.

[Jay North]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for your time and comments. Sorry for my late reply. This project has kept me very busy!

I did some testing using a .SAT file exported from Rhino into a masisng family. Although this was very accurate, I had trouble positioning it correctly. And it would mean the arch having to update steel section sizes as we develop the design.

In the end I used adaptive components as you suggested, it worked pretty well, and means that when the arch updates his wirframe dwg, I can re-host points to the nodes and the adaptive components automatically update. Then its just a case of reselecting 3d edges for the sweeps that are used to create the members. (see attached image).

Thanks again!