Drawing Index

[tjk0225]

Is there a way to include consultants (autocad generated) drawings in a sheet index with the architectural drawings (short of adding blank sheets into Revit for each sheet).

[sfaust]

I've been wondering about this too. The only thing I can think of is to just make a blank sheet with the right name/number and don't print it. Anyone know a better way?

[gregcashen]

That's what I do.

[aaronrumple]

Blank drawing works for me... However I have a titleblock family that has a watermark across it that says "See AutoCAD Drawing" Kinda like "This page left intentionally blank." Juts in case someone prints all sheets and wonders why there is no info on that page....

[Scott D Davis]

The ability in Revit to take an entire consultant sheet, and link it into a 'blank' sheet would be a huge plus, as long as everything displayed/printed exactly as it should from AutoCAD.

We could then set up an entire set, with a correct index, and let Revit manage it. Plotting and batch plotting everything would be a snap!

[PeterJ]

Could you use a blank title block, or perhaps just some invisible lines to locate the sheet, perhaps with a name and a number label outside the sheet border, so you can see it if you print a reference shet at a reduced scale. With that method you could load the consultant's drawing via a link to a drafting view and show the drafting view on the blank sheet.

You may have to do some preparation to the AutoCAD drawings to make sure paperspace items are pasted into model space, which becomes a problem with viewprots that crop the underlying model. A workaround would be to print as a jpg from AutoCAD (Ithink there is a driver that ships with AutoCAD to achieve this) and then load the image.

Similar tricks should work with dgn files.

[PaulB]

Do you think that adding the Consultants sheets to yours is likely to increase your exposure to Professional Indemnity claims ? If the Consultant has somehow updated his sheets but has forgot to send them to you or there are mistakes on his sheets. Are you taking on some of his responsibility by incorporating his drawings into yours.



Just a thought !



Paul

[tjk0225]

While the liability issue is a concern - if a consultant working under our contract issues an update, it should be issued through our office. In theory, we should always have a current set.

Aside from that, I don't want to have the maintenance of updating links to all of the consultants drawings - I usually get a hardcopy, dwg and pdf files. I typically use the dwg and hard copies for reference/coordination and the pdfs to print/distribute as needed.

The bank project I am working on is currently 60+ sheets - about 23-24 are architectural and interior design (our scope), the rest are our civil, structural and MEP consultants. I definately don't want to take AutoCAD drawings from 3 consultants on at least 2 versions of AutoCAD and deal with all of the xrefs and linking them into the Revit file. I was hoping to avoid adding blank sheets as place holders (makes the list of sheets in Revit awfully long).

I have also had a situation where I have (2) Revit files for a project - one with the building and a second for the site with the building linked. Would be nice to include the sheets from one rvt file in the index in the other rvt file.

Since the drawing list is sort of a special schedule, it seems like the capability to add external drawings sheets (from AutoCAD or another Revit file) to the list would be very useful.

[Scott D Davis]

What if we get the ability to link DWF files into Revit? Consultants could create DWFs, which eliminates the whole xref, layer, linetype scale, text, leader arrows, etc. issues. We could then link a DWF of a consultant's sheet into a Revit sheet. Perhaps its a blank sheet, but the properties of that sheet we can 'input' sheet number and name.

When consultant changes occur, they create a DWF of the same file name, we replace new DWF for old DWF, and the set updates.

[aaronrumple]

Then I *might* like DWF... but would still rather have PDF.

[tjk0225]

Linking a PDF of consultant drawings into a Revit file for inclusion in a drawing list would work great with our workflow.

[BomberAIA]

I create blanks sheets for my consultants as you said above. I have not tried it for a large project yet since I only created a Revite Title Sheet recently.