patricks
2011-10-20, 08:49 PM
On the heels of this thread: http://forums.augi.com/showthread.php?t=133957 we had another staff meeting/discussion today about the direction my boss is wanting to take our company and the services we offer to clients. Basically we want to try to glean as much cost info, maintenance info, and other info out of our models as possible. We're even planning on things like life cycle cost analysis that will clients better budget for maintenance costs down the road (i.e. budget so much per year instead of having huge repair costs sneak up on them).
One thing we were discussing is how to best document what finishes are used in a building. For each room or space we would like to document every type of finish used, including manufacturer, any pattern or color names, pattern or color numbers, and possibly even amounts of such materials.
Now of course for some things it will be easy. For ceilings, just schedule your ceilings. For floor finishes, just place 1/8" thick floors on top of the structural floors (as we've been doing for several years now) and schedule those.
The big issue I see is walls, specifically wall paint. Sure if a room is all one color, or only has 4 walls, it's pretty easy to document what paint color is used. But what if the room has more than 4 walls? What if it has more than one color in the room? We tossed around a number of ideas, including different wall types, splitting surfaces, or maybe a wall-hosted family that could be tagged and scheduled. All of these ideas seem like it would be hugely labor intensive, and a massive pain if any walls ever move. With wall types you'd have to have thousands of different types for every different color, and color combination of colors on each side of the wall. In the end we're really looking for some way to tag a wall and have its paint color show up on a "Paint Plan" of sorts.
In the end it's all about providing the end user (client) with information they need about their building in a way that's easily accessible. What if 5 years down the road the client wants to use a paint that's in one room in a different area? If we had this information documented it would be easy to find the room and find out what paint brand/color is in the room. But getting that stuff scheduled just doesn't seem feasible with the tools Revit offers.
Revit is all about coordination and being able to document information about a building. But something as simple as paint colors seems a near impossibility in terms of keeping up with it, keeping it organized, keeping it correct, etc.
Has anyone else tried anything like this or have any ideas we could try?
One thing we were discussing is how to best document what finishes are used in a building. For each room or space we would like to document every type of finish used, including manufacturer, any pattern or color names, pattern or color numbers, and possibly even amounts of such materials.
Now of course for some things it will be easy. For ceilings, just schedule your ceilings. For floor finishes, just place 1/8" thick floors on top of the structural floors (as we've been doing for several years now) and schedule those.
The big issue I see is walls, specifically wall paint. Sure if a room is all one color, or only has 4 walls, it's pretty easy to document what paint color is used. But what if the room has more than 4 walls? What if it has more than one color in the room? We tossed around a number of ideas, including different wall types, splitting surfaces, or maybe a wall-hosted family that could be tagged and scheduled. All of these ideas seem like it would be hugely labor intensive, and a massive pain if any walls ever move. With wall types you'd have to have thousands of different types for every different color, and color combination of colors on each side of the wall. In the end we're really looking for some way to tag a wall and have its paint color show up on a "Paint Plan" of sorts.
In the end it's all about providing the end user (client) with information they need about their building in a way that's easily accessible. What if 5 years down the road the client wants to use a paint that's in one room in a different area? If we had this information documented it would be easy to find the room and find out what paint brand/color is in the room. But getting that stuff scheduled just doesn't seem feasible with the tools Revit offers.
Revit is all about coordination and being able to document information about a building. But something as simple as paint colors seems a near impossibility in terms of keeping up with it, keeping it organized, keeping it correct, etc.
Has anyone else tried anything like this or have any ideas we could try?