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Thread: Lighting Level Calculation

  1. #1
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    Unhappy Lighting Level Calculation

    Hello! I am fairly new to Ecotect. I am trying to calculate the natural light distribution (in footcandles) over the floor surface of a roughly 30,000 sqft building.

    I've exported the 3D model from Revit as a gbxml file (.xml) and successfuly opened it in Ecotect. The model in Ecotect is simply planes: floors, walls, windows, etc. The material properties from Revit seem to have carried over to the Ecotect model.

    Problem: I've started out by trying the calculation in just one room. At the current rate it will take about 7 hours to calculate just the one room. Is this normal? Or is the Ecotect model simply too large and/or complex?

    Thanks for any help!

  2. #2
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    Default Re: Lighting Level Calculation

    Are you trying to do the light level calculations within Ecotect? If so, the settings for the calculations can have a stupendous effect on the calculation time. The Ray-Tracing Precision setting in particular can drastically alter the time it takes to get a daylighting result from the saftware.

    I would suggest bypassing the internal Ecotect calculations entirely, and exporting the model to Radiance for daylighting values. You can download desktop Radiance from http://radsite.lbl.gov/deskrad/download.htm. Admittedly, it was somewhat of a challenge to successfully install and integrate with Ecotect, but it was worth the effort.

    -Crawford

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    Default Re: Lighting Level Calculation

    I found it to be easier to only model the room I was wanting to analyze in ecotect and perform the calculation there. With daylighting you aren't concerned about heat transfer through walls. Just making sure walls are shaded if they are shaded. Depending on the size of the space and what your calculation levels are set at, it could take several hours to complete the calculations. The longest calc I had was 2.5 hours for a large gym space with 32 windows in it.

  4. #4
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    Default Re: Lighting Level Calculation

    Yes, smaller models are calculated faster. It is not always neccessary to redraw the room. If you are using Revit (for example), cut your modell with the 3D-Section area. Revit will only export the "rest", which is still visible.

    I have got another question: I did it this way, but after importing my model into Ecotect, it is not on the basic grid, while watching it in the perspective. I am also not able to cut the building by using "cut away section" due to it's size and distance to the cutting surface.

    Does anybody have an idea?

  5. #5
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    Default Re: Lighting Level Calculation

    Hi Everybody,
    From where do you set the "precision of ray-tracing" option?
    Regards,
    Adam

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