Duplicate Family Types

[ehull33]

When copying or pasting information from one file to another it often duplicates family types instead of using the orriginal family type. For instance, in "Project 1" you will have "Family Type" and in "Project 2" you will have a different instance of that same "Family Type". When you copy "Family Type" from Project 2 into project one, Instead of simply having multiple instances of "Family Type" it comes in as "Family Type2".

The warning comes up as this:

"The loaded type "Family Type" has been renamed to "Family Type1" to avoid conflicts with the existing type. "

This happens to some but not all copied Families so I have no idea what the cause of this duplication is. If anyone has any insight, please inform me.

[phyllisr]

There are a number of explanations and despite all the things we do to keep our content current and our templates up to date, inevitably, duplicate families will creep into every project at some point. This is one reason among many that we use the Ideate tool. Revit does not think about families the way AutoCAD thinks about blocks. Here are a few unfortunate examples from the trenches.

Explanation #1
John Doe started Project 1 and used an annotation family called DOORTAG. A week later, Jane Doe starts Project 2. Jane calls to request a new family type with a slightly wider box (in the interest of graphic consistency, we do not allow our teams to edit annotation families). I accommodate her request and update the network family to include Standard, Wide and Extra Wide types. I load this into the two templates we provide and post the change to our Weekly Updates. Jane reloads the family into Project 2. The following week, Jane loads a unit plan group from John's project complete with tags and annotation. John did not reload the family because he did not need the Extra Wide type (or maybe he had not read the Weekly Updates or maybe he forgot or maybe he thought someone else would do it). Therefore, the family definition in John's project is different from the family definition in Jane's project and she gets the message you noted in your post.

Explanation #2
We install Revit for our first pilot projects using all default settings and folder structure. We complete half a dozen projects and decide to migrate to Revit from competing software. We plan the migration carefully and make a few adjustments to folder structure based on our pilot experience. One change is the Detail Component folder. After the firm-wide migration, John Doe discovers he wants a detail that Jane Doe had created during the pilot phase. Jane's detail used a metal stud that John is also using. He inserts Jane's old drafting view into his project and gets the message you noted in your post. Even though the component is the same and has never been opened, Revit recognizes that it is different because the families had a different source.

Explanation #3
John is a cowboy who likes his personal component for CMU and thinks the entire QC team that approved the network version is wrong. Therefore, he just changes it by editing the family from his project and does not bother to name it something else. Jane likes a drafting view he created and inserts it into her model. Jane used the network version so when she inserts John's drafting view, the definition for the component is different even though they are named the same thing. Therefore, she gets the annoying message.

In some cases, you can use Select All Instances, make a swap and then purge the unused family. If Cowboy John actually changed the dimension for the component, you could have a mess. If you get this for annotation families for column bubbles or sections, it is a little more tedious to fix. If you get duplicate names for families with instance parameters (like Break Marks), I would not bother to make the switch - you lose the instance information and would have to check every view.

Good luck solving this!

[ehull33]

That seems to be exactly what is happening! I ended up just selecting instances, changing them to the orriginal and deleting the duplicate family. It really didnt take as much time as it looked like it might. A few components changed sizes but nothing too dramatic. Thanks for your input!

[phyllisr]

One more thing to watch that drives me nuts is duplication that results when you migrate from one Revit version to the next. We use a batch upgrade for all our network content. Unfortunately, all our templates and all our existing projects will now recognize the upgraded families as new.

[Steve_Stafford]

Another scenario involves Worksets. When two users add the "same" family to their local files and Revit detects this "sameness" during a Synchronize with Central you end up with Same Family and Same Family (1), more if more users do this at the same time. It is fun at class time when I have people do this...helps them realize how much more they need to discuss things so they don't all do the "same" thing.