Revit vs. Auto Cad for residential house plans

[raymondjdawson925863]

I am a student studying construction management. This summer I want to draw residential house plans on the side. I have had quite a bit of experience in Revit and feel the most comfortable using it but the draftsman at the company I work for swears auto cad is the only way to go. Should I invest time in learning auto cad. Can Revit keep up with ...pass auto cad when it comes to drawing residential elevations, roofs, and plans?
Thanks

[Steve_Stafford]

Do the work in Revit. If someone needs dwg files then export from Revit. You already know Revit. Nothing wrong with knowing more software but there is no point being inefficient if it's your sidework.

[charliep]

My regular work is allmost exclusively re modelling and I use Revit. Much quicker and more accurate in my opinion.

[dmarshall]

My company does a lot of work for national housebuilders in the UK and we use Revit for the production of all the drawings. We now only use Autocad for legasy work.

You can produce a lot more information in a shorter space of time so stick with Revit.

[raymondjdawson925863]

Thanks for the comments. I found them very valuable. I enjoy using Revit. I am glad to hear that guys are using Revit in a residential setting. Most of what we talk about in class is BIM and clash detection...not as useful in residential. Are you guys using Revit for your Take offs as well?
Thanks

[jsteinhauer]

I am a student studying construction management. This summer I want to draw residential house plans on the side. I have had quite a bit of experience in Revit and feel the most comfortable using it but the draftsman at the company I work for swears auto cad is the only way to go. Should I invest time in learning auto cad. Can Revit keep up with ...pass auto cad when it comes to drawing residential elevations, roofs, and plans?
Thanks

Hi Ray,

I suggest you race this draftsman on a set of plans. Generate your exterior elevation, interior elevations & sections. Generate schedules for the windows & doors, room schedules, as well as material take offs. Then change the window & door sizes, and see if he can catch up. Even if you're not that proficient in Revit, you should be able to blow him out of the water. Only issue you may have is family content.

Also ask him to generate a 3D model for renderings. Attached are some files from a residential project I did with 1-2 years of experience in Revit. This house went together very well, and using Revit helped the client understand the shape and feel of the house, prior to it being built, with the use of renderings, live sections & walk-through.

Hope this helps,
Jeff S.

[Revitaoist]

I'll also say Revit is much better than CAD, and this is an age old debate. Anyone saying CAD is better than Revit has a bad case of sour grapes. But, you should take the time to learn CAD. It is a very powerful program, and having a diversity of skills is worth the time invested.

[damon.sidel]

I definitely have to agree with Revitaoist about learning Autocad. At least for quite a few years to come, it is still the most-used drafting program in the construction industry. I imagine your goal upon graduating will be to get a job, so learning the most common software would be wise.

That said, I think the drafter at the company is speaking from an uninformed and inexperienced (with Revit, anyway) point of view.

[MikeJarosz]

Learning a full featured CAD system is a major undertaking, and some people, after mastering their first software package, also expect it to be their last. In my opinion, that is an unrealistic expectation.

I began my career years ago with pencil and yellow trace. Today, I expect to be downloading Revit 2013. I have learned four completely different CAD systems, not counting versions. I have worked in every version of Revit since version 6. At that time, the Acad skeptics were laughing at us. Until we unveiled the World Trade Center in Revit, that is.

Just as Acad swept away the competition in its heyday, I believe Revit is poised to overtake the entire building industry, not just architectural design. Look up some architecture job ads. A few years back, they required Acad, Revit desirable. Today they require Revit, Acad desirable.

Anyone planning to continue only in Acad had better be planning their retirement too.

[zanzibarbob7]

This issue is a "No Brainer." Use Revit. If you look at it from a efficiency standpoint ask, "How far can you leverage your work?" Revit is the winner. Also ask, "If I only have time to learn one program which should it be?" Again, Revit is the winner. Learn Revit first and if you have time learn AutoCAD. It's like learning English first then learning French, German and Swahili, later. People who push Swahili as a first language usually only know Swahili and are just too narrow minded to learn anything new. Revit!!!

[kimberlycsmith19608497]

Revit is definitely a better option. AutoCAD is meant to be a tool though. Benefit that Revit offers is parametric modeling which can make changes uniformly across the model when a change happens in a particular part of segment of the model. This makes design changes very easy to incorporate in a model or construction drawing set. Changes can be quickly incorporated in model and then extracted in drawing format.

[rbcameron1]

I come from a AutoCAD background, so I would point out that it is beneficial to learn the ideas and tools behind autocad since you will ultimately at some point in time import/export cad to and from Revit. Beyond basic understanding of how to change layers, draw lines, polylines and areas there is no reason to invest more than a few days in cad. Anyone who disagrees probably doesn't realize the integration aspect of Revit + Navisworks + 3dsMax + slew of other autodesk products. Can I use CAD in these programs too; absolutely. Will I? No way. I'm not going back to friggin CAD.
As for a student.....learn Navisworks along side Revit. I can't imagine a CM degree more valuable than someone with both skills.