Adjusting Building Elevations to Site Elevation

[Henry D]

I have drawn initially my First Floor Elevation at 0' and all the other building heights are set from that elevation. I now have topo elevations which I will import and the FF elev. has to come up to about 753. What is the best way to adjust my building elevations? Do I simply select the entire structure and move it up 753'?

Thanks

[Steve_Stafford]

Go to a section or elevation view, dimension and lock every level you have. Locking them all will let you change one elevation and "force" the entire project to a new elevation. Warning!! You'll spend some time cleaning up column lines and such because they'll be REALLY long afterward...

Of course you'll save a copy first...

[GS Fulton]

I have found it a lot easier to move the topo down by the difference of 0 and the topo elevation at which the floor will be. That way I can keep my height references simple. Since I generated the topo from an autocad drawing I turn the topo numbers on so they will be correct reading on the site plan and they superimpose my topography. Cheating a little but I have found it to be simpler.

[Steve_Stafford]

True, but when the boss says he wants "true" elevation values on, by golly you put em there...

[Henry D]

Steve, the locking levels to reset all elevations at once didn't work for me.

I just found out that there is a neat way of resetting my elevations. See the Tutorial under Project Documents called "Setting a Project's Base Elevation". You establish a new shared level and then from the Tools menu, choose Locations and Coordinates, and then Relocate this Project. Essentially what is happening is the viewports in the project are shifted, but the project remains stationary.

[Steve_Stafford]

You know, I actually read that at one point, but I've done what I suggested at least twice now and it's worked fine both times, go figure.

Post your "find" as a tip if you wouldn't mind.

[Henry D]

I am wondering how you were still able to have all your scope boxes and views not affected if you moved the entire project. Anyway, I'll post this as a tip.

[Steve_Stafford]

Wasn't using scope boxes so that didn't factor in...but I definitely did have to adjust views. That was my warning earlier, but in each case I made the decision to change early enough that it wasn't a big deal.

[David Conant]

Using Locations and Coordinates (also known as Shared Locations for linked projects) provides you with several opportunities.
1. You can define both a "real" elevation and a project elevation system and set your elevation annotations and spot elevations to display the one you choose. This will allow you to start working on a project using some nominal elevation as a basis. Later, when you get survey data, you can easily use that data to set true elevation values without moving anything, resetting any views, or suffering from unexpected changes in extents. Simply modify the parameter in your elevation type that controls the "Basis" and all elevation symbols will be updated.
2. You can set up both a True North and Project North. Individual views can be oriented to that either true or project north. You can thus easily show a site plan with True North oriented to the top of the sheet and still keep you floor plans set with Project North up. All text will align correctly eithout special rotation, no additional callouts are required, etc.

David Conant AIA
Autodesk Revit

[Steven Campbell]

David Conant AIA
Autodesk Revit

Nice Avatar - Boss


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Steven Campbell
Autodesk Revit