Revit Structure Hindrance or Help

[christopher.pynn]

All,

Wanted to ask a question and maybe get some feedback with regard to
what others feel about the performance of Revit structure say versus
architecture. We are finding that on concrete projects that have a lot of
replication and curved geometry on plan that its becoming almost unpractical from
A time and cost point of view to use Revit. Only machines running 64 bit and 8gb of ram
Stand any chance.

Are others out there finding similar issues ?
What methods are people adopting for repetition in condos for example ?
Do people feel the concrete auto join actually works ? We find with curved elements its very very bad.
Finally what about the analytical model ? Is that a must or does it cause more problems
Than it solves ? Is there no room to only use the solid model as an export for analysis like the bentley translators.

I guess a lot of these issues will have been discussed before but for the sake of my own
Sanity I wanted to get this off my chest. I can't take having to sit and wait for 10 seconds
Evrytime I click the mouse. It doesn't make good business sense.

Ok look foward to some replies and am open to trying any technqiues or advice

Cheers
C

[Craig_L]

Firstly, try turning off graphics accleration. It sounds silly but it will actually make your system run alot smoother.

Also, in the background run "Worksharing monitor for autodesk revit <insert version number here>"

If you see the performance guage climbing up into the red, minimize and go get a coffee, or better still restart. Cache memory gets slowly eaten up during the day, and the problem you are describing to me of waiting every mouse click is exactly what used to happen to me before turning off graphics accelorator. I run a 64bit with 8g RAM and by the end of the day, if i have had revit running all day long, it tends to chunk up a bit, I usually restart around 2.30 or 3pm so I dont start tearing great chunks of hair and scalp out.

As for detailing structures, I enjoy using revit. I find it more enjoyable to model than draw.
And I ALWAYS say this, but the real time saving comes later when you are starting to do elevations, and sections. you can cut as many as you want in a much shorter time than if you were to do in normal CAD, and you can also drop a small 3d image of a difficult connection onto a page so an erector/builder/detailer can see exactly whats going on.
I think the strenghts of revit outweigh 2D, and will continue to grow from here.

Revit also has alot of other features you can utilise such as takeoffs, instant schedules, all this sort of stuff you just cant get out of 2D packages...for me it's head and shoulders above.

Having said that there are some downsides but like any software, there's usually a workaround or sollution out there .... somewhere.

[m20roxxers]

Having used Revit now for a while I can say without a doubt we have saved a fortune. Average work hours per number of users is down about 40%-60% compared to 3 or 4 years ago. Revision times are abit more complex depending on revisions required so we have guessed a difference between 20-80% reduction on man hours compared to traditional comparisons based on significance of changes and project size.

My best examples I have to date for speed, was a train station that we took the model from some great Architects and we had the prelims out in 8 hours.

30 story concrete residential structure taken from CAD in which we did our GA's and reo rates and tender work in 18 hours (pretty much straight up so not too hard).
We actually sat on both projects for a couple of weeks as we didn't want to get them excited otherwise they'll get crazy ideas about how fast it is but we still delivered under deadline times.

Reo rates, tender information is down by alot based on our Engineer quote templates we pass Architectural models too and strip them down (most scheduling tools, and a couple of basic customised tools, plus some traditional practices). Our engineers also setup an engineering Revit model in some cases or we do, for Etabs, Spacegass and a few other engineering packages and send it back to the analytical model then we setup copy/monitor with it to strip what we need as required or copy to clipboard.

The only CAD work still done by us at this stage is the reinforcement column schedules, and our PT high and low tables, though I would love to see the lisp routines we have incorporated into Revit, I don't even have close to that of experience with the API yet unfortunately.

As for model sizes we only have 4 64bit machines in the office and they are used to strip Architectural models, marketing and analysis, our sizes typically range from 20mb (5mill plus custom homes), to 110mb(70 story project), includes all documentation.

32bit is fine as long as your worksets set up correctly.
The hardest part is your content, standard practices and change management processes to get it to work and you need everyone on board.

The extensions tools are awesome, especially the content generator that was recently added, I don't know if everyone has customised the templates buried in the API that come with it, but it's made our lives so much easier. Also compare model, model checker and design review are awesome for quick markups and reviews.

The hardest part is dealing with companies who are not as familiar with Revit, I know there are alot more top notch Architects using Revit then engineers but there are also some pretty atrocious guys to and trying to tell them how to work to makes everyones lives easier is talking to a brick wall.
Also handing Level of detail agreements, usage of model and other BIM contracts can worry people as it's outside their traditional experience, but it's the most effective way of understanding the workflows they take, so we can make our projects come under budget.

It's not about being good at revit that makes you profitable, it's about a complete mind change in how the whole company functions that makes this a reality which is why some will struggle while others will fly.

[christopher.pynn]

thanks for the replies.

Sorry wasnt maybe too clear in my orginal message. We have been using Revit Structure here now since the first release so understand the product pretty well and most of the pro's and cons.

I am just starting to get a bit down beat about the product in particular with insitu concrete buildings that we do here. these type of projects can be pretty large, we have one which is 8 blocks of 18 storeys sat on a podium deck and basement.
Its a condominum so there is a lot of repetition and we find that there is no really practical way for using groups or linked files to help lessen the amount of work needed to build a full model.

We are also finding that the autojoin for concrete really applies limitations to groups, and beam slab combinations that have splines as edges which most condos do these days. nothing is straight.

I tend to think that a lot of this is related to the analytical frame and the way in which it expects certain constraints to be in place.

One example we often come across is we have a unit all modelled and joined perfectly but when trying to amend a beam size or alter a slab all the other beams become unjoined. now this is happening more and more regularly and its taking its toll on how long things take to the point where u have to question whether its acutally worth it in the long run.

So I guess what I am asking is whether other see similar issues or not ?
Is there a consenus that the analytical frame is good or bad for example ?
or
has anybody cracked working in condominiums for Revit Structures.

cheers
C

[david_peterson]

I'll start off my saying that IMHO, the concrete tools are still big time lacking. They kind of clean up, but then there's the 8000 workarounds you have to do to clean up at inside corners. We also still have to do the column schedule in Cad. But it works, I'm not going to say I've gained a lot of production out of it. Mainly because half the time I go to modify something I can't or I get an error, and I have to start over. So for me it seems easier to delete and start over.
As for the analytical model, we've turned it off. Haven't used it in a while. Don't care if ends are connected. We did export once from Revit to ram to help our Engineers start a ram model. But from their point, they don't trust it and spend more time fixing things than it would have taken them to start from scratch.

[Alan aka cadalot]

I would really love to hear from someone in the UK that is actively using Revit for RC detailing and producing acceptable schedules.

[Craig_L]

thanks for the replies.

Its a condominum so there is a lot of repetition and we find that there is no really practical way for using groups or linked files to help lessen the amount of work needed to build a full model.

C

This sounds odd to me, groups, beam systems, and a few other tools really allow you to do repetitive work easily and quickly. I would think Revit is better at repetetive stuff than it is at 6 different buildings (like I just did) where every floor plate, and roof structure was completely different.