design options or saveas?

[crl_arch]

We are currently working on CA for an office remodel project. The owner wants us to explore value engineering options, so I was going to use Design Options to do that. I haven't used this tool before, so it does not seem to work as well as I would like to have a separate option showing VE items such as are moved 2nd floor deck, atrium, etc. It is cumbersome to use it, so I thougth it might be better to and less cumbersome to just SaveAs the file and create a separate project file that has the revisions in it.

Being new to Design Options, I'm appealing to the wisdom and experience out there if you think in this context it is better to use a separate file or if Deisgn Option would be better. I might be missing somehting, but it seems to me that Design Option is more for element revisions (i.e., varying roof designs) not necessarily entire sections of the project like I am dealing with.

Wisdom and input appreciated!

Thanks,
Craig

[hand471037]

Design Options are awesome for smaller things, for example doing mulitple options for interior office layouts. Or the example you give of doing different roofs. And while you can 'extend' it beyond that, and pretty much have whole parts of the building being mananged by Design Options, you start to get minimed returns if you will, for your modeling has to be a lot more careful the more you put into the options.

This is because only one option, the Primary, actually joins intelligently with the rest of the model. So you've got to make some more complex 'seams' for your other options so they join convincingly to the rest of your building. However, it's great to be able to schedule the whole model along with the Option, for it makes VE like you're doing easier for certain cases.

So where I find Design Options having a lot of value is where one part of the Project is changing a lot, but the rest isn't so much anymore. For example, doing multipule entry and street facade options for a large commercial building. The rest of the building is largely figured out by this point, it's just the street side and lobby, so I get a lot of value out of swapping between Options.

If you've got lots of stuff in lots of places changing, and changing a lot, then it starts to be a real pain to manage it all via Design Options, and you might be better off going with SaveAs and/or linked models instead. In other words, if you wind up with just a tiny part of your Building NOT in a design option, then you might want to reconsider your approach. ;-)

[SCShell]

Hey there,
I thought I just responded to this.....
Please see the duplicate post under "in practice"
Steve

[cliff collins]

Another way to study alternative designs:

1. Model a particular design alternative
2. Select all of the components/content
3. Create a Group
4. Link the Group, which creates a new Revit Project--give it a name like "Option 1.rvt"
5. You can then work on the new Revit project independently of your overall project.
6. Create additional "options", then make Groups/link per above

Once final design is chosen, link back into main project, then "bind" .
You still have the "other" options as separate .rvt files as well.

This method give you a bit more flexibility than Design Options--which can be a bit complicated/confusing--esp. late into a project.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Cheers.....

[crl_arch]

Thanks guys,

It sounds like I need to go the save as route. I appreciate your input. I can't tell you how helpful these Augi forums have been . . .

SCShell . . . yes I ended up posting in the "In Practice" forum but really should have posted it hear. Sorry for the confusion and thanks for responding!

Until the next hurdle!
Craig