rotate piping / sanitary fixtures

[rsteiner.181711]

For some reason I can not rotate a elbow/tee to conect to a floor drain or any kind of fixture, and how do you do a vertical pipe from fitting to fixture, I am hitting a brick wall, and these tutorials are not helping.

[jvedio]

Draw a small piece of piping off of the fitting first, and then use the "connect into" command to attach a fixture to the small piece of piping.

[Steve_Stafford]

When you select a fitting take a look at the little icons that scatter around it. Click the Rotate icon, the curvy arrow, to rotate the fitting 90 degrees at a time.

When you want to sketch a pipe from the fitting, start the pipe tool, click on the connector icon on the fitting and move your cursor away from the fitting...that's important...move away from the fitting. Then hit the space bar to acquire the workplane of the fitting and its size. Now take a look at the Options Bar. You need to enter an Offset that will project your pipe to a new vertical elevation value. Type it in and move your cursor off the Options Bar so the value "sticks" and then click the Apply button on the Options Bar. You should now have a section of pipe from your fitting.

As the previous post suggests it may be much easier to simply use the Connect Into Option when you select the fixture if there is a section of pipe in the correct location. You can then switch fittings to get a more appropriate one to continue the layout.

Hope this helps...

[DMagillIII]

Is there a way to rotate a pipe fitting at smaller increments than 90°. Plumbers regularly tip a wye at 45°off pitched pipe, in order to help prevent clogs. Using the Rotate command spins the entire run, including the pitch. I can't seem to find a way to rotate pitched pipe without changing the direction of a run. Any advice would be much appreciated.

[se13gits]

Draw a small piece of piping off of the fitting first, and then use the "connect into" command to attach a fixture to the small piece of piping.

This "connect into" command is the "auto-connect" under the "modify pipe" tab when working with rigid piping? Cause if it is I still don't see it being easy to connect vertical piping from horizontal lines to drains/fixtures/other pipes on top/bottom plane. I have been using many section views/view depth changes to get the penetrations I have connected w/vertical piping to the horizontally branching floorplan piping I have running underneath it.

[Steve_Stafford]

Connect into works with a fixture and pipe, not between pipe and pipe. The fixture won't even enable Connect into if there is pipe attached to the fixture, need to delete it first. You can use Routing Solutions between pipe - pipe if you select both pieces. With 2012 "ignore slope to connect" it's probably easier to just sketch from pipe to pipe if it isn't a plumb riser situation.

[se13gits]

Connect into works with a fixture and pipe, not between pipe and pipe. The fixture won't even enable Connect into if there is pipe attached to the fixture, need to delete it first. You can use Routing Solutions between pipe - pipe if you select both pieces. With 2012 "ignore slope to connect" it's probably easier to just sketch from pipe to pipe if it isn't a plumb riser situation.

How would you tackle the following connection problem?
Please see the attached jpegs.

I can't seem to connect this guy easily at all.
Help.

[DMagillIII]

I'm sure you've already tried this, but with clunkers like that, I seem to have the best luck with repeated Align commands, from both Section and Plan view. When you're absolutely certain that you've aligned it enough, give it one more pop from each applicable view. Then try a simple Trim. If the first trim attempt fails, try using the other pipe as the primary. if all else fails, try redrawing the nearest elbows, and then re-Trimming.
Best of luck.

[se13gits]

I'm sure you've already tried this, but with clunkers like that, I seem to have the best luck with repeated Align commands, from both Section and Plan view. When you're absolutely certain that you've aligned it enough, give it one more pop from each applicable view. Then try a simple Trim. If the first trim attempt fails, try using the other pipe as the primary. if all else fails, try redrawing the nearest elbows, and then re-Trimming.
Best of luck.

Thanks Don_M. Yeah, true true I've always used section and floor plan and 3-D view with view depth tweaking to get the connections I need.

Meh, this looks ugly as hell but I'm not sure if the pipe autoconnecting 11' MEP gets any better than this. :/

See attached jpegs for results from Don_M solution.

[Steve_Stafford]

From your images, assuming the stack is in the correct location or at least where you want it to be so there is intentionally some offset between the toilet and the stack...

Try removing all the fitting and pipe that is currently in your image between stack and toilet. Reconnect the stack so it is "one" pipe passing by the toilet. Select the toilet and click Connect Into. Then click on the stack pipe to tell Revit to connect them. See what Revit creates as a result.

Will that work? Get an error message? An error would indicate that there isn't enough room between them to create the fittings defined by the type of pipe being used.

You can also draw a pipe from the toilet (in plan view), make sure the Options Bar shows the elevation of the toilet (Space Bar will let you toggle between connector elevation and elevation relative to the Level). With Automatically Connect active you can draw the pipe over to the stack and see if Revit connects more like you want.

[se13gits]

From your images, assuming the stack is in the correct location or at least where you want it to be so there is intentionally some offset between the toilet and the stack...

Try removing all the fitting and pipe that is currently in your image between stack and toilet. Reconnect the stack so it is "one" pipe passing by the toilet. Select the toilet and click Connect Into. Then click on the stack pipe to tell Revit to connect them. See what Revit creates as a result.

Will that work? Get an error message? An error would indicate that there isn't enough room between them to create the fittings defined by the type of pipe being used.

You can also draw a pipe from the toilet (in plan view), make sure the Options Bar shows the elevation of the toilet (Space Bar will let you toggle between connector elevation and elevation relative to the Level). With Automatically Connect active you can draw the pipe over to the stack and see if Revit connects more like you want.

Thanks for the suggestion Steve but that specific .rfa starter fitting from Charlotte Pipe is what I need that toilet drain to connect into and Revit MEP 11' refuses to give me the option to upgrade my fitting from elbow, tee, etc to a starter fitting (does not come included in mep family lol).

I really like that 60% of the time the "Magic Auto-Connect" will respond to my wishes with a generic elbow, tee, or whatever connection and then its easy for me to switch out the generic fitting with a .rfa family fitting element to get the BIM for the pipe I'm working on accurate.

Tried experimenting with that "Magic Auto-Route Piping" feature and yeah my fittings in these kinds of situations are always really close so I will always get that "not enough room or angle is too steep" error. I hear the manual pipe layout is a lot safer/better.

Perhaps I should trial version the MEP 2012. I hear they did wonders for the plumbing in that release. I'd like to see if they made it any easier to distinguish different elevation piping on the same floor plan or made it easier to route/connect piping in 3-D plan view.

My regards for all your guys' help. If you think up any easier ways please post it up.

[moliva]

you might try turning your section and 3d views to "fine" detail and turning on "thin lines". This may be helpful to visualize things.

Also, what is this that you are modeling? Is this a design or as-builts or coordination dwgs? You may consider cost vs. benefit to determine what is necessary.