Complex Curtain Systems

[Dimitri Harvalias]

Not sure if anyone is using this approach but I thought I'd pass it along.

Problem-1: Your curtain system design requires angled mullions/muntins at various angles or unusual shapes and you can't get Revit to create them automatically.
Problem 2 - What to do when you are exploring options for complex curtain wall systems and the grid layout can't be easily set up using Revit's built-in grid layout tools? The thought of having to turn various curtain grid sections on and off seems very tedious and way too time consuming.



Solution 1 &2: Try creating custom curtain panels that fake the layout using extrusions. You can use the Revit curtain wall tools to create the basic grid layout, for example floor to floor height, and panels of a fixed dimension.

Infill panels can be various materials, mullions can be varying widths, depths or profiles, panel styles can be swapped out very quickly, using the project browser, to explore different options. You can create various parameters for the extrusions and/or panel sections that will allow various spacing to be tested for a fixed layout. Parameters can also be used to test various ‘proportional’ layout concepts



I can only think of a couple of drawbacks to this method. First, if the system requires vent windows, or any other panel element that requires scheduling, it may require a sort of nested approach to the tag. Second, at the detail level elements will be shown with as much detail and complexity as the extrusion used to describe them (actually not much different than the current curtain tools)

[Scott D Davis]

Where you need to schedule a window in a curtain wall:

In 7.0, a wall type can be used as a curtain wall panel. You could set a wall type up to be 'glass' material at 1" thickness, substitute that 'wall' in for a panel, now it will host normal windows, which will schedule. Build your vent window as a family, and insert it into the 'panel', which is actually a wall. Make sense?

Here's an example...the "panel" with the window is actually a wall type. (I know, bad example of a wood framed window mounted in a piece of glass.....)

[Scott D Davis]

Another interesting use of using walls as curtain wall panels, is that they will accept any wall based family, including wall sweeps. You can very quickly use sweeps to represent mullions on a panel.

In the example, the mullions at the perimeter of the glass panels are normal curtain wall elements. The end panel with smaller mullions and round mullion elements are wall sweeps. These sweeps can be controlled with grips to be placed exactly where you want them to start and end. ANY profile can be used!

[bclarch]

Nice tip Scott. Might have to print this one for future reference.

[kmorales]

on a similar note -

we're using a curtain wall system to create an elliptical wall that has stone panels on the interior finish face and gyp bd on the exterior corridor face.

due to the walls geometry we'd like to use the curtain panel system so that we can easily control the spacing of the panels using the curtain grids. however, we do not want the gyp bd to become panels also - is there a way we can control this ?

- or -

is there a better way to do this?

we'd rather not build (1) wall assembly overtop of another - that is how we modeled the finish stone panels previously.

please advise.
thanks.
:)

[Andre Baros]

kmorales, I think you'll have to use two seperate walls if you use the curtain wall meathod. You could also just use a simple wall (your gyp wall) and add the stone panels to the inside using a railing. The stone panels could be either custom posts or custom railings and you could use the rules of the railing to control the spacing.