Interior Design model link to ARCH model

[pfaudler]

Dear friends,

I have been through Scott's AU 2009 class handout on Interior Design and Revit. I must admit that it is very impressive. I have been trialling a method whereby we can link ID model into ARCH model. We would have ARCH model with wall (no finish), floors, ceilings, doors, windows, and rooms (may be) etc. In ID model, we would like to have finish wall, rooms, furniture, room elevations, finishes material take-offs, room based finsh matrix etc.

I have two queries on proposed method.

1. How do I cut door/window opening in finish walls in ID model. I assume that we start ID model with either CM ARCH walls or copy/paste ARCH walls and set them to monitor. But when i draw finish walls in ID model and join them to CM ARCH walls, It doesnt cut openinings in finish walls. Am I missing something here?

2. Rooms. Since we can not CM rooms, I understand we have to manage rooms in both models in order to generate room based schedules etc.

I understand there are various ways to address ID and ARCH packages interaction, i.e. one mode with worksets etc. (as per Scott's handout). But the main reason we would lilke to go down the ID-ARCH linking route is because this is how our teamwork is setup in our company.

Can you please share your experience on this subject?

Thanks in anticipation of your response.

I would ike to take this opportunity to wish you all and the AUGI a Merry X'mas and a Happy New Year.

[cliff collins]

[QUOTE=rahul.shah;1034879]

1. How do I cut door/window opening in finish walls in ID model. I assume that we start ID model with either CM ARCH walls or copy/paste ARCH walls and set them to monitor. But when i draw finish walls in ID model and join them to CM ARCH walls, It doesnt cut openinings in finish walls. Am I missing something here?

2. Rooms. Since we can not CM rooms, I understand we have to manage rooms in both models in order to generate room based schedules etc.


We are using this method, and here are some suggestions:

1. Place all the Interior Walls AND Finish Walls in the ID model, this will solve the "cutting" problem.(--OR-- you could edit the ID wall profile to "fit" the openings, but I would not recommend this.)

2. Place Rooms in the ID model, and create Schedules in that Revit file.
The Linked Shell model can be set to Room Bounding to "close" the Rooms' perimeters.

Then, you can issue 2 sets of drawings:

1. Arch Shell & Core Package
2. Interior Design Package

There will be issues along the way with Linked models, but the benefits outweigh the downside.

cheers............

[UpNorth]

If you have access to Revit MEP you can use it to place Spaces in the ID model. Spaces will allow the ID model to report the Room object numbers. You onyl need to add the Space with Revit MEP and then you can work in RAC.

[pfaudler]

Thanks Cliff and UpNorth for your quick response. Much appreciated.
Unfortunately we do not have access to MEP so we cant explore/use space option.

Cliff,

I had also thought about the option you mentioned in which we have interior walls in ID model. But I dont see it working for our setup. When archtiects start a model, they place all walls in ARCH model and control the layout of the buildilng throughout the project. What ID team does is looks after the final finishes of the walls, ceilings, floors, FF&E loading, schedules etc.

Another option I am thinking is to map the ARCH walls to Interior walls (ARCH walls + finish layers). But I understand doing this would break the walls alignment, No? Or has this been fixed in RAC 2010?

OR

Copy/Paste ARCH walls into ID model (or save ARCH model as ID model to kick off ID model) and set walls to "Monitor" to ARCH model.

In an ideal world, I would like to have ARCH model holding all walls without finishes and have ID model holding walls with finishes, FF&E, schedules, room elevaations, etc.

I am also not sure how to adddress ceilings? I believe ceilings cant be CM. So coordination between ARCH-ID would be challenging. Floors can be CM so its fine. Like ARCH-ID walls, I can apply the same rule to floors.


I would also like to hear from Aaron Maller and Scott Brown on this topic. I visited Aaron's blog http://malleristicrevitation.blogspot.com/ many times and read between lines under CM topic on Interior Design/Architecture interaction. But still have some confusions. Scott's AU 2009 handout material is very very informative on this subject too. Three case studies he has shown amazes me. Fantastic work. I quite like the workflow he mentioned on page no. 21 about how he splits ARCH and ID models (please see captured screen shot from that handout). This is exactly I would like to achieve.

Thanks in anticipation.

[twiceroadsfool]

Hello Rahul- Thanks for the shout out. Ive been meaning to write in there recently, but have been bured BURIED at work.

Scott is definetely the person to ask about Interiors, i havent done nearly as intense of Interior work as he has, Architecturally or Revit-ally.

I can tell you what i know about File Linking and Copy Monitor, and what i personally would and wouldnt do, but Scott may have better ideas that differ from mine as hes ventured MUCH MUCH farther down the road.

But, heres my take (only on a few of the items, since theresa lot to cover):

1. Walls. I would NOT copy/paste/Monitor, and i would NOT Copy/Monitor, nor would i *save as* the arch model to start. I personally would do this: The architectural walls are the architectural walls. For me- that includes Gyp. (ITs necessary to be defined in the partition type for us, since it dictates Rating and STC values). I would put the walls in the arch model, then in the Linked ID model, make "thin walls" for finishes. Their walls being just the Tiles, the Coverings, the whatever. What do you do for paint? Im not sure. Id probably model a very thin wall, but thats an off the cuff guess since i havent had to do it that much. Im not sure what to do about Openings, honestly. Id LOVE to peek at Scotts handout to see how he handles that. A lot of the time we do ID on another workset of the same Model as arch (ours arent as intense as his) so a simple Join Geometry handles the Opening issues quite nice.

There are a number of reasons i wouldnt Copy/CM/save as the arch walls. Youre going to want the walls seperated in each room, and the arch walls wont be that way. Youll spend more time splitting and editing and reconfiguring, than you will running new walls around the perimeter. THEN you can monitor THOSE to the arch walls.

Plus, the Copy portion of Copy/Monitor is a giant PITA. Its quirky, it finds the EXTENTS of families with openings, not the openings, which makes that fairly useless. It even finds things not visible (not present) in the model, if its defined in the family. Its buggy about wall joins, and it only copies from wall CL to wall CL, as Steve Stafford reminded me at AU a few years ago. That doesnt SOUND to bad until you try to use it in the real world, than its just annoying as all heck.

Floors- we do the same thing: Its in the arch model if ifs got to be detailed in the arch drawings. If its just a finish floor (carpet, tile, whatever) it can go in with the "FIN" stuff. (As i said, we do it mainly in the same model, and use Filters to control visibility... But it would be the same for Linking).

The room situation sucks. The way i see it, theyre in the architectural model because they have to be. Casework and Furniture is ehhh for us. Ours is in the arch model, but not for any good reason. IF i was seperating an ID model, id certainly move it over there. Im not entirely sure what i would do with scheduling rooms at that point. There are a bunch of crummy workarounds, and i would default to someone whos done it more. I know with our MEP guys we wait as long as possible, then have them copy the rooms and paste. It sucks, but its what we do. Then we make sure to tell them if we change anything.

Im definetely hoping to check out Scotts class though, if i can see it online this weekend.

[sbrown]

Scott here Thanks for all the praise, I certainly don't deserve it. The reason we did 3 case studies was because there isn't a "right" answer to your questions. All methods have pro's and cons. The one you are chosing to use (case study #1) in my opinion (if you were in the actual class) is the worst to use unless you really have to. There is alot of coordination between teams that has to be done. Ie Rooms, Room schedules etc. have to be done in the arch model and the ID team has to give the info to the Arch team to input. Same with doors. the ID team would create the door panel families and the trim families and give the door panels to the Arch to insert into his doors. Or you could have the Architect create only the frames and the ID team insert and schedule the panels.

Can you post the type of project you are going to work on? The project type will affect which option to go with. Ie if you have something that lends itself to a core and shell and then interior fit out. Option 2 works best.

On a side note, we had 3 hours or more of content to present but it was only a 90min. Class. So maybe next year we can come up with a format that allows those doing both ID and Arch to get together and share in depth workflows. Its really hard to demonstrate the pros and cons of each method without more time. I'd love to hear suggestions on how to present this material logically and usefully in the future.

[twiceroadsfool]

Scott- I think its a big enough topic with enough interest that you have an informal meeting (sort of like AU Unplugged) that runs for a full half day. This is the *real meat and potatoes* for a lot of users. To actually get an AU Unplugged room with AV equipment would be great. But you could kill a half or an entire day going over pro's and con's of the different solutions, and i think THATS the kind of power-user-group-discussion that needs to be going on at AU.

I would totally be up for participating, and im definetely planning on being there next year.

[sbrown]

I agree. I would love to get a room for an entire day with top users from different companies and each share our workflows then document the best practices as a group. Then a follow up class presenting the findings to the masses.

[gwnelson]

This is the *real meat and potatoes* for a lot of users.

So for now we have to settle for Tofu 'n Turkey Bacon?

[twiceroadsfool]

LOL, i didnt mean it like that. Its just that if you search the posts here on AUGI, people have TONS of questions about the UNsexy of architecture and Revit: Partition schedules, door details, Finish plans, Fire ratings, Standard Detail libraries, Naming conventions and on and on.

That brings up a host of items people need to know how to circumnavigate: Revit catagories versus architectural catagories, interacting with Linked files (hence this post), how to make legends work when legends dont work, how to load content in to a template (youd be surprised how many people dont know, and they end up with Familyname, Familyname1, Familyname2, Familyname3 in their project).

Ill bet you could fill a room for a week talking just about "how to get **** done" in Revit, LOL.

Scott, im on board and will even vounteer to be the secretary, LOL.