Changing rectangular mullion width creates bajillion errors

[ameliephaine]

Hello, folks!

I previously considered myself somewhat a Revit wiz. This problem has me thoroughly humbled and doubting my sanity. :|

Our project has custom profiles for head & sill mullions, and uses the typical rectangular system mullion profile as our vertical zero-sightline mullions.

Our final profiles have come in for these dimensions. I have no trouble changing head and sill mullions. I can also change the thickness and offset of the rectangular profile with no problems. However, when I try to change parameters for "width on side 1" and "width on side 2"... Revit goes absolutely bonkers.

This is a multi-family housing project, so there are a fair number of stacked groups throughout the project. But why would changing every other aspect of the mullions go through without a hitch and this one change blow Revit's mind? Groups are pinned in place but dimensions are not locked.

Order of errors (paraphrased):
1) Constraints are not satisfied. (I don't care. Nobody cares. proceed.)

2) Changes to groups are only allowed in group edit mode. use the edit group command...do you want to ungroup? (Uhhh. no. Please don't destroy the project, Revit.)

3) If I do click to ungroup, just out of curiosity, it then gives a second 'changes only allowed in edit group mode' error and asks me if I want to resolve errors by deleting elements. (noooooooo)

4) If I click to delete those elements, just out of curiosity, it then tells me that the last copy of 3 different group types has been deleted and the group type will be removed from the model


Anyone have guidance on this? I can't open every single group and change mullions individually. That is a severly un-Revit-y thing to do and will take *forever* to do in this project.

Help, me, obi-wan ke-augi... before I start smashing the keyboard with my face. Thanks!!

[Steve_Stafford]

If you create a group that contains a curtain wall then you need to Edit one instance of that group to make changes to the curtain wall. When you substantially change a mullion's proportions and they are very close to a boundary that has very narrow panels it is possible that Revit no longer thinks is can create a panel or a mullion on the grid that defines its location.

Using Groups and Curtain Walls is a reasonable way to manage propagating a consistent design throughout a building's exterior but it is wise to use a unique Curtain Wall type for each unique configuration so you are less likely to run into this hierarchical constraint issue. In other words, if you have Curtain Wall configuration A, create a group for that. If there is a Curtain Wall Configuration B, create a separate curtain wall type first and then put that in a new group. This way you can edit a group and only affect one kind of Curtain Wall when you change something in that type's configuration of parameters. When the same kind of curtain wall is in more than one group you can wind up with a Catch 22, you need to Edit a Group to make the change but it is also in another group and you can't edit that group while trying to change the underlying Curtain Wall in the first group.