Electrical Plans

[rodneyf]

Hi All,
I am having a real tough time trying to create an electrical floor plan with what comes with Revit. I always thought the symbol for a telephone outlet was a triangle (filled or not), am I going crazy :screwy: ? Why can't I get my light fixtures to show up on the plan I have changed my view range and from hidden line to wireframe and still no lights? Am I correct that you cannot do a filled region in a family file? Please help a poor soul who has lost his mind and at such an early time in the day. :?

[gregcashen]

Hi All,
I am having a real tough time trying to create an electrical floor plan with what comes with Revit. I always thought the symbol for a telephone outlet was a triangle (filled or not), am I going crazy :screwy: ? Why can't I get my light fixtures to show up on the plan I have changed my view range and from hidden line to wireframe and still no lights? Am I correct that you cannot do a filled region in a family file? Please help a poor soul who has lost his mind and at such an early time in the day. :?
I'll take a stab...there are more electrical symbols on rugi and I think one of the Chris's (Y or Z, I can't remember) posted an electrical symbol family zip file a while back. You can't see your lights in the plan because, presumably they are not on the floor. You need to create a reflected ceiling plan view that will show what you are looking for. If you use standard templates, these will be created for you in advance at each of the floor levels.

[Yman]

I don't even use reflected ceiling plans. I use the regular floor plan and change the settings of the objects to a grey tone for the background and then I made these electrical symbols, see attched example, to really be just representational only. No light capabilities for rendering and things. The outlets, phone, switches do show in the sections and etc.

If this is what you want let me know and I will post. Check out the attached file and see if this is what you want.

These symbols are reworked from the ones I posted I think 3 or 4 weeks ago. The electrical stuff is actually symbols now instead of model lines, which means they will scale accordingly to the view scale.

Y.

[rodneyf]

I grabed a couple of the symbols from RUGI and that is what lead me to making this post. So they are symbols as in annotation symbols? If that is true then you can have a filled region and now I can have elec. symbols that match our old ACAD stuff. How did you go about setting up the outlet if you don't mind me asking?

Thanks,

[David Conant]

To create families that behave like model families but have elements that work like annotation symbols, you need to load an annotation family into the model family.
Create a Generic Annotation family with the symbolic representation you want. Text can be included.
Create a new model family for the object. Draw any model graphics you desire (or none), create 3d elements, etc. You can create model elements that are visible only in certain views such as elevation or 3d. Load the annotation family into the model family and use the symbol tool to place it in plan view. Save the family and load into your project.
In plan views, the annotation part of the family will display as an annotation element does (text visible, scale independent size etc.). The model parts of the family will display as model elements do, in the views you have set them to be visible in. The family will schedule and tag properly.
See the 5.1 electrical fixtures library for examples of how this works.

[rodneyf]

I was wondering how you got a half switched outlet to show with a filled region. That sure is a good little tid bit.

Thanks,

[gregcashen]

Alright, I have played around with this for over an hour now and am feeling stupider and stupiderer. I decided to finally just put a frickin' invisible line through the axis of the model (in this case a ceiling fan) down about 8'. Then in my electrical plans the cut offset will cut through the line and it shows up in the plan.

Can anyone maybe explain in more detail how to create a ceiling-based electrical/lighting component that will show symbolic elements in the First Floor Electrical Plan while showing model elements in the reflected ceiling plan and other views...all with the same component? I have tried a bunch of different settings, but right now I am using the invisible line trick and it is making the symbol appear superimposed on the model in the rcp...other views are okay. I am tired and going home now, but any help is greatly appreciated!

[beegee]

Alright, I have played around with this for over an hour now and am feeling stupider and stupiderer. I decided to finally just put a frickin' invisible line through the axis of the model (in this case a ceiling fan) down about 8'. Then in my electrical plans the cut offset will cut through the line and it shows up in the plan.

Can anyone maybe explain in more detail how to create a ceiling-based electrical/lighting component that will show symbolic elements in the First Floor Electrical Plan while showing model elements in the reflected ceiling plan and other views...all with the same component? I have tried a bunch of different settings, but right now I am using the invisible line trick and it is making the symbol appear superimposed on the model in the rcp...other views are okay. I am tired and going home now, but any help is greatly appreciated!

Greg,

I think you on exactly the right track. The invisible line from the ceiling component to the floor is the best way. Go into the family and adjust the visability setting to show the symbol when in the floor plan view, and the model in the reflected ceiling plan view ( using the "electrical fixture -ceiling based" family template ).
A very simple example is attached.

beegee

[gregcashen]

Good to know I am on the right track. I am going to modify all of my electrical families to do this and I will post them to Rugi or something so others can use them if they care...I'll let you know.

Thanks

[Nic M.]

David Conant wrote:

Create a Generic Annotation family with the symbolic representation you want

I'm into that now. I have a filled region and want to draw some lines in this filled region. Looks good in the symbol family. Load the symbol in the lighting fixture, poof lines are behind the region fill???

Anyway arround this?

I have also set the lines from the region to a specific linetype but now I get an error that a line in the region is to short

[PeterJ]

Nic

If you wish to draw a circle with a cross in it as a filled region then it seems the only way is to make four quadrants then the lines forming the edges of the quadrant will show. It appears than when loaded into the project the filled region will take precedent over the drafting lines. so you have to cheat and make the lines a part of the definition of a filled region.

[Nic M.]

Pete

Done the circle cross thing last week and it worked OK
Now I can't cheat anymore because the filled region lines is a"extremely short line"
Thanks for the response, now I know I diden't miss something

[Vincent Valentijn]

Can anyone maybe explain in more detail how to create a ceiling-based electrical/lighting component that will show symbolic elements in the First Floor Electrical Plan while showing model elements in the reflected ceiling plan and other views...all with the same component? I have tried a bunch of different settings, but right now I am using the invisible line trick and it is making the symbol appear superimposed on the model in the rcp...other views are okay. I am tired and going home now, but any help is greatly appreciated!

Greg.. have a look at this one, I've made it quite a while ago.. still works..

[christo4robin]

I'm working on a project that requires both renderings and cds.

I've taken a light fixture from rugi, added my generic annotation and a vertical invisible model line. Seems to work fine once I have turned off the visibility of light fixture model elements in my plan view and the generic annotation family in my rcp view.

Is this the way others are handling this? I.e., having a symbol show up in an electrical floor plan and having the model elements show up in rcp.

Thanks,

Christopher

[kurthompson]

What is the best way to create the annotation symbol used in the electrical fixture .rfa components (i.e. Outlet Annotation inside of Outlet-Duplex.rfa)? I cannot seem to find the original symbol/annotation that is embedded in the Outlet-Duplex.rfa that ships with Revit.

This has long plagued our standards and I'd like to resolve - eventually...

thx|k

[beegee]

Text is placed by loading & placing a Generic Annotation Label, from the Annotations family category, into the Electrical symbol family .

[kurthompson]

thanks. maybe i need more explanation on my end - attached is the electrical fixture Outlet-Duplex.rfa that is shipped with Revit. the plate on the wall is modeled in this file, the symbol which is used to represent the outlet in floor plan, however, is a nested component: Outlet Annotation.

where do i find that nested component? we've been working around this issue for 3 1/2 years and have developed our own ways of doing things, but i'm interested in figuring out how Autodesk handled this (as in the above & attached)?

any more thoughts?

thx|k

[ihammerhands]

Are you trying to have power and lighting on the same plan? I have found it best to seperate the power and lighting plans i.e. outlets and data, electrical panels on the power plan and lighting, exit lighting, and light switches on the lighting plan (reflected ceiling plan). The exception being a switched outlet. You have to pay attention to you cut planes but few of my electrical/lighting symbols have a invisible model line.

Does this help?

[kurthompson]

Are you trying to have power and lighting on the same plan? I have found it best to seperate the power and lighting plans i.e. outlets and data, electrical panels on the power plan and lighting, exit lighting, and light switches on the lighting plan (reflected ceiling plan). The exception being a switched outlet. You have to pay attention to you cut planes but few of my electrical/lighting symbols have a invisible model line.

Does this help?


if this is for me...no, i am only trying to create a power/data reference plan and i'm only interested in showing the power/data outlets. i can create the plans, etc. the only issue i'm having is creating an annotation that scales appropriately (like those that ship with Revit - i.e. Outlet-Duplex.rfa) with the view.

i created a generic annotation, loaded into my .rfa, modeled the 3d elements and then loaded it into my project. for fun, i loaded the default, shipped with Revit component as well. i placed the two into my plan, side by side, and the Revit component scales nicely with my view scale. my component, however, does not scale nicely with the view AND it comes in a different size than the Revit one (even though i traced the Revit component)...am i the only one having this issue?

attached are the files...(Revit 7.x)

thx|k

[Steven Campbell]

where do i find that nested component?You can find the nested annotation components on the web library. http://revit.autodesk.com/library.asp Look under one of the subscription libraries / electrical fixtures / electrical annotations.

Steven Campbell
Autodesk Revit

[kurthompson]

that's like gold! awesome! thanks a lot, steven. this will answer/solve all my issues now that i can open these components and edit them. sweet.

thanks!

[Steven Campbell]

no problem...

[Jit]

To create families that behave like model families but have elements that work like annotation symbols, you need to load an annotation family into the model family.
Create a Generic Annotation family with the symbolic representation you want. Text can be included.
Create a new model family for the object. Draw any model graphics you desire (or none), create 3d elements, etc. You can create model elements that are visible only in certain views such as elevation or 3d. Load the annotation family into the model family and use the symbol tool to place it in plan view. Save the family and load into your project.
In plan views, the annotation part of the family will display as an annotation element does (text visible, scale independent size etc.). The model parts of the family will display as model elements do, in the views you have set them to be visible in. The family will schedule and tag properly.
See the 5.1 electrical fixtures library for examples of how this works.

I though annotation symbols dont react to scale, i.e. if they are drawn at 1:1, they cant be put into say 1:50 ?

[Haden]

You can find the nested annotation components on the web library. http://revit.autodesk.com/library.asp Look under one of the subscription libraries / electrical fixtures / electrical annotations.

Steven Campbell
Autodesk Revit
Thank you very much! :banghead: I was banging my head against the wall trying to save the annotation family from the family browser within a Revit-supplied Electrical Fixture Switch family (3-way, because the "3" was too far from the "S"), and it was not giving me that option!

I now have been able to download and modify the symbols as I need them. Thanks again, Steven! :D (By the way, Revit Staffers, why is it not possible to save an annotation family out from within a model family?):?:

[Steven Campbell]

(By the way, Revit Staffers, why is it not possible to save an annotation family out from within a model family?):?:
The annotation can't be saved out because they were nested before we had that functionality. I believe they were made in 5.0 and saving out families was available in 6.0. To fix it reload the family with a 6.0 version or newer, like the one on the ones on the web library. Then you will be to save them out . I suppose I better open a bug against myself to reload them in the CD content..;)

Steven Campbell
Autodesk Revit

[Andre Baros]

I was using the lights I set up with the invisible line connecting the 3d model in the ceiling and the plan symbol on the floor, and now I've got a new problem. The invisible line doesn't lock to both the ceiling and the floor, so in a project with different ceiling heights (esp high ceilings) the symbols don't always show up. Instead of manually adjusting the length of each invisible line, is there a way to lock an element to both the floor and the ceiling, so that it stays connected to the floor even when the ceiling height changes?

[kevin.matherly]

I too am having problems creating an electrical plan. I have created a Reflected Ceiling Plan and am attempting to add light fixtures to it and get the following message:

"None of the created elements are visible in Reflected Ceiling Plan: First Floor Electrical Plan View. You may want to check the active view, its Parameters, and Visibility settings, as well as any Plan Regions and their settings."

When I play with the view depth settings that seem to fit with the Revit Docs, I get this message:

"View Depth Plan is set below Top Clip Plane"

which seems strange to me as it seems you would want your view depth below the top clip. If I use view depth "unlimited" the error goes away but I see things I don't want to see. If I set the cut plane where I would see my ceiling fixtures, I lose all my door and window detail as the cut plan is above the headers.

Isn't there a doc or tutorial available for creating electrical plans.