Kick-Starting Revit MEP- Have an important question

[sfraney]

Hi Guys/Gals,

My office is a starting their first project using Revit MEP. We have electricla, mechanical, and plumbing engineers, as well as our architects all under the same roof. The architectural department has created a model for the MEP people to link up to but my questions is this.

If all three MEP departments are working on this project, do they all work off the SAME Revit MEP file and use worksets? or do they each create their own Revit MEP file, one for electrical, one for plumbing, one for mechanical?


Any guidance here would be great, it would seem to me that making the engineers work from one single Revit MEP file using worksets would make the most sense, again, we are all under the same roof and work for the same company.

[dmb.100468]

If you are all working in the same office it makes the most sense to create one Revit model and utilize worksets. Linking separate Revit files has a different workflow than using one model. It works well, but you can find many benefits in coordination by using one file.

Alot of this depends on the type of project also. If it is going to be a very large, complex model you may want to consider using separate files. I have noticed poor performance in large models that contain all disciplines.

The key is to plan how the model will be shared prior to creating it, so you are already taking the right steps. Good luck!

[kyle.bernhardt]

I agree with Don that an all-in-one approach brings the best workflow benefits for MEP discipline coordination.

Depending on the size of the project, I would also agree that you should be breaking up your model. However, my recommendation would be to break it up by region of the building, maintaining all disciplines in each file. This provides the best cost benefit from my experience.

As for worksets, I highly recommend that you use Element Borrowing exclusively, and do not create Worksets for the individual disciplines. Creating Worksets for the disciplines largely defeats the purpose of an Element Borrowing approach. Element borrowing is the best workflow today to manage ownership issues in MEP projects.

My final words of advice would be to utilize our Systems functionality. Having a lot of Elements in the "default" systems can be quite troublesome with multiple users in a model. That's something that's significantly improved in the upcoming release, but still the best practice to ensure proper team workflow.

Hope that Helps,
Kyle B