About site and grading plans

[Kroke]

Argh...I remember doing this waaaay back, like 3 years ago. In fact the Revit guys were cool enough to walk me through this on the phone, it was the reason why I purchased Revit in the first place because of how cool the site/grading tools are.

However, I was really green back then and I've forgotten a lot of what happened in that phone call, I was just happy to complete the grading plan.

So here's the question:
I have an existing imported topo I'm using. The problem is, the building pad falls 12' from one end of the house to the next. What do I need to be concerned about as far as phases are concerned? I have to show existing and finished grades. So it seems if I modify the existing grading plan, it won't be in the 'finished grade' plan that I'm after.

How do I go about this? I need to seriously modify the site and I just want to make sure I'm taking the correct steps so that I don't have to re-do it or find out that I've ruined the original site by accident.

I looked for the Revit vids online that they used to have when they showed how to do this but the link was dead on adesks site (big surprise).

I'm thinking it must be linked to phasing as it was how you guys stepped me through my first addition with phases also.

Thanks for any info, I'm starting to stress out here...*gulp*

JJ

[Steve_Stafford]

Create the existing topo in an existing phase.
Switch to your next phase.
Use the site topo GRADING command, you'll pick the existing site topo
Revit makes a copy and put's it in the current phase.
Edit the topo in the current phase to reflect what it needs to be
After you are done, check the properties of the new topo surface, you'll see cut, fill and difference entries if you need to refer to them.

That's a start right?

[hand471037]

Kroke, first you split the region you want to modify, and then you pick the 'Grade Region' tool on the site toolset, and select that bit of topo. It will get moved into an earlier phase, and demo'ed in the current one, and a copy of it will be put into the current phase, which it's good enough to take to straight into editing.

Just be certain to pick the 'copy all interial points' option when doing this, otherwise you'll only get the border of the bit of topo defined (which is great when leveling stuff, not so good for modifying stuff).

Again, this only works if the Topo is in an eariler phase prior to starting this. otherwise there isn't a phase for it to be existing prior to have it be coped to and all that stuff.

[Kroke]

Thank you guys, yes, that will be a very good start for me! Here I go...................

[Kroke]

Ok, the only thing that seems to be confusing to me, if I'm hearing what you're saying is right.

I've made everything on Phase 2, so are you saying to make my new topo to Phase 3 (the portion that I want to change that is?) Before I edit it?

Then I set my phase filters to what? New only? Sorry to keep pestering, I wouldn't if it weren't so important.

I even purchased Scottonstott's thing but it didn't even touch this area, I'm sure there are a lot of things else I can learn from it though. Sigh...

[Steve_Stafford]

All you have to do is add another phase beyond the one you created the topo in. For example: if you have existing and new construction phases, you'd put the topo in existing. Then you switch the phase of the same view to New Construction, using a phase filter so you still see the topo. Use the Grading command and Revit will copy the existing topo and put the copy in the current phase. Edit the "new" topo in the same view in phase New Construction. You'll end up with a topo that is your original topography and a new graded topo.


I'd put the topo in the earliest phase you have to it predates the house, then the new topography can occupy the same phase as the house.

Make sense now?

[Andre Baros]

One thing that will make your life much easier, once you're editing the topo, is to change to a wireframe view. If things are too busy, just add reference planes to locate your building and then turn off everything exept the topo and reference planes. When cutting and filling landscape it's easy to loose control points for the new topo under the old topo in a hidden line view. Also, don't worry about getting the grading all correct using the "regrade tool"... once you've used it once to create the old and new topo you can keep on changing the new topo by just editing the sketch.