Prompt to Save Positions after Moving AutoCAD Site Plan in Building Model

Posted by Veng

Once Revit has acquired coordinates from the AutoCAD file, any time you move the CAD Site Plan in your Revit model, Revit prompts you to Save Positions (image below). It means Revit will write the new position into the CAD file. (No one should have the CAD file open when you Save Position). There is NO going back once Revit write the new position to the CAD file.

When the Save Position dialog box appears, you are given three options:

Save Now – Report (save) the position of the relocated Site Plan to the CAD file.
OK – Keep the relocated Site Plan location but don’t save it now. You have the option to save it later.
Cancel – Undo Site Plan relocation.

If you selected “OK” earlier and decided the relocated Site Plan is at the correct location, click Manage tab > Manage Links (under Manage Project panel) > CAD Formats tab > Save Positions, to save the new location to the CAD file.

Why overwriting the CAD file?

You will probably question why Revit needs to overwrite the CAD file if the CAD file was originally used to define the Shared Coordinates. From what I understand, in AutoCAD, the coordinate system is fixed but the model is movable. In Revit, the model is fixed but the coordinate system is movable. An analogy is the CAD Site Plan is a table cloth. Since Revit already defined the Shared Coordinates, the coordinates are fixed (Basically, Revit won’t allow you to change it once it is defined). With a fixed model and fixed shared coordinates, moving the Site Plan = moving the table cloth. Revit has to report back to the CAD file how far the Site Plan has been moved relative to the “fixed pin point” - Shared Coordinates.

Why Acquire Coordinates?

North2 1 300x206 Setting up True North for a Project Best Practice

Our goal is to ensure models from all disciplines locate correctly when they are all linked together. In order to achieve this, Revit needs to define one common point (Shared Coordinates) in the model. As an analogy, each model (i.e. Arch, MEP model) is a piece of paper. To ensure they all stack up correctly on top of each other, we pin them down. This pin is equivalent to the “Shared Coordinates” in Revit.

We only need to acquire the common point coordinates from one model or CAD file (usually the Site Plan).

Why acquire coordinates from the Site Plan but not vice versa?

We define True North for the project by acquiring the coordinates from the Site Plan. Revit reads the Y coordinate in the CAD file as True North. When changing the Orientation from Project North to True North in the View Properties in Revit, the building model will rotate automatically with True North pointing straight up in the View. With this point defined, consultants can link and acquire (Pull) the coordinates from the Architecture model. This point is the “Shared Coordinates” for the project.

When to Acquire Coordinates and Publish Coordinates?

For Single Building on a Site, use Acquire:

LINK the CAD Site Plan/Revit Site Model into your building model (do not import!).
Position the linked Site Plan correctly relative to your building.
Acquire Coordinates from the Site Plan.
Send the Architecture model to all your consultants for “work sharing point” coordination.
Consultants Acquire Coordinates from the Architecture model.
Congratulation! Everyone is now sharing the same coordinates across all disciplines.

For Multiple Building on a Site, use Publish:

Open the Revit Site Model.
Link all building models into the Site model.
Publish Coordinates to all building model (I will publish coordinates to MEP model as well only if you are using in-house MEP consultant and the model is located in the same sever, you may skip the rest of the steps if that is the case).
Send the building model to all your consultants for “work sharing point” coordination.
Consultants Acquire Coordinates from the Architecture model.
Congratulation! Everyone is now sharing the same coordinates across all disciplines.

In both cases, the consultants are acquiring coordinates from the Architecture model. Giving the Site Plan to the consultants to acquire coordinates is redundant since the shared coordinates are already defined in the Architecture model, and the consultants are working from the Architecture model anyway.

If you are not planning on linking any site plan into the model, you can use the simple approach in my previous post – Setting up True North for a Project.

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Setting up True North for a Project

Posted by Veng

Last week, I talked about what True North and Project North is. This week, I am going to walk you through how to setup True North for a Project.

Update: This tutorial is intended for projects that do not require linking or showing the site model in the Construction Documents, but want to show the plan at a True North orientation in some Views. DO NOT use this method if you plan on including site plan in your project. Please visit my other post for detail explanation - Setting up True North for a Project – Best Practice.

I will talk about linking model in another post. Let’s get back to this simple tutorial. First you need to know where True North (North in the Real World) is in your model, this will determine the orientation of your model on the Site Plan. You can acquire this information from the civil or survey file. With that, you can figure out the degree angle* your model needs to rotate.

For the purpose of this exercise, I have created a simple model and draw a big North arrow (pointing True North) next to it to make it easy to understand. Keep in mind the current view is set to “Project North”.

Locate the Project Base Point

With the First Level Plan opened. Go to Visibility/Graphics Overrides (VG). In the Model Categories > Site > CHECK “Project Base Point”.

A blue icon will now appear on your plan. This is the Project Base Point in your model. The Project Base Point is the origin (0,0,0) coordinates. This is similar to the AutoCAD origin (0,0,0). Select the blue icon, noted the Angle to True North reads “0 degree”. In Properties, enter the degree angle. In our case, it is -30 degree*. Once again, always acquire the degree angle from your civil or survey file!

The “Angle to True North” should read the degree you entered just now (360-30 in our example), but you should see NO change to your plan.

Now go to the Site Plan view, this is where the magic happens. To switch the view to show True North, go to Properties > Orientation, and select “True North”.

You will see the building model immediately rotated with the North arrow pointing straight up in this view. By switching between Project North and True North, Revit is only rotating your view, but not physically rotating your model. If you open up the First Floor Plan, the plan still remains nice and straight as before.

Degree angle*
If True North is on the right side of your model, enter a negative degree number. If True North is on the left side of your model, enter a positive degree number.

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Project North vs True North

Posted by Veng

Project North vs True North is a confusing topic for most new Revit users. When you first started a fresh new project, Project North and True North are both set to point straight UP. So what is the difference, why do we care? It is very uncommon to see a building oriented straight North in the real world. However, for the ease of documentation, it is preferable to lay the floor plan nice and straight on a sheet in the Construction Documents, and show the correct building orientation in the site plan. We all know that rotating the building model after the fact is very problematic in Revit, so how can we satisfy both of our needs in Revit? This is where Project North and True North comes into play.

Here is a simple explanation of the two:
Project North: The building will be oriented the way an Architect wants to display on a sheet for the ease of dimensions and documentations.

True North: Actual North in the Real World. With North pointing up vertically in this view, the building will be oriented relative to the North in the Real World.

By default, all Plan views are set to Project North, but on the Site Plan view, we will set the view to True North to display the actual orientation of the building on the site.

I will talk about how to Setup True North in a Project next week. Stay tune!

Please note that by switching to True North, Revit is only rotating the view, not the building model!

Customize Revision Number

Posted by Veng

By default, the revision number is the sequence number in the Revision Schedule. Revit will assign the first revision as sequence #1. But what if you need to start your revision number as a different number other than 1 per your client’s request, for example ’0′?

It is embarrassing if we have to explain to our client that your request cannot be done because Revit doesn’t allow us to do so. Fortunately, there is a way to get around this, it is not the perfect solution, but will definitely get you the end result you wanted. Remember, our goal is to serve our client, Revit has a tool helping us to provide the service to meet our client’s need, we are not a slave of the software. By the end of the day, all we care is whether we can get the work done and our client is happy.

Sorry, it was a little off topic, let’s get started! In this tutorial, we will need to go back and forward between the project and the families. All text in Green are related to the Family editing.

In our Project File, Go to View tab > click Revisions (under Sheet Composition Panel).

With the Revision Schedule opened, notice the “Issue to” and “Issued by” column? We rarely fill out these 2 columns, so instead of using it as what it is intended for, we can use one of them as our Revision Number column! In this example, I used the “Issued to” column. Let’s say I need my Revision Number to be “15″. Type in “15″ in the “Issued to” column, click OK.

For the purpose of this demonstration, we need to create a Revision Cloud. Go to Annotate tab > Revision Cloud (under Detail panel), and start drawing a revision cloud.

With the cloud selected, go to Properties and assign it to the revision we just created. To give a delta revision tag to the cloud, go back to Annotation tab > Tag by Category (under Tag panel, see image above). The revision number should still read as “1″ in both the title block and revision delta, but don’t worry, we haven’t done our magic yet.

Open up the Title Block family, in the Project Browser > Views (all) > Schedules > Revision History (every firm may name their Schedule differently, in this tutorial, I name the schedule “Revision History”). With “Revision History” schedule selected, go to Properties > Fields (under Others) > click Edit.

Select “Revision Number” from the “Scheduled Fields” (right box) and Remove it. Then Add “Issued to” from the “Available Fields” (left box) if the parameter is not in the “Scheduled Fields” box yet. Select “Issued to” and Move it to the top of the list if you haven’t done so.

Continue to click the Formatting tab, select “Issued to” and make sure the Hidden Field box is unchecked. Save the family and reload it back to the project.

Back to our Project file, check the Title Block on the Sheet with the revision cloud and you should notice the Revision Number 15 now appears on the Sheet.

Let’s move on to changing the revision number tag that is associated to the cloud. Open up the Revision Tag family, select the number inside the delta. Go to Properties > Label > click Edit

Remove “Revision Number” and Add “Issued to”. Save the family and reload it back to the project.

Go back to our Project file, the revision delta should read 15.

If you need to add another revision, just go back to View tab > Revisions (under Sheet Composition Panel) > Add a new Revision (see the first image in this post). Input the Revision Number in the “Issued to” column. Cloud and tag the changes, the newly added revision will show up on the Title Block.

With this method, we basically ignore the Revision Number / Sequence Number that is automatically assigned by Revit and replaced with our manually entered Revision Number.

Want to learn about true north and project north?

When you work in a team, it is important to properly set up project orientation to get everyone on the same page. I wrote several posts about this topics:

I also have a practical example tutorial to show you how it is done in real projects. You can get it immediately after you join my newsletter. You will get email updates to new articles on my blog conveniently in your inbox and additional tips from me about how to use Revit efficiently for your job. Just enter your name and email below. You will get an email asking you to confirm your subscription. After you confirmed, you will get a link to my free PDF tutorial.

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LEARNING REVIT

My journey to learning Revit

Prompt to Save Positions after Moving AutoCAD Site Plan in Building Model

Why overwriting the CAD file?

Related post to this topic

Setting up True North for a Project – Best Practice

Why Acquire Coordinates?

Why acquire coordinates from the Site Plan but not vice versa?

When to Acquire Coordinates and Publish Coordinates?

Want a practical example tutorial?

Setting up True North for a Project

Locate the Project Base Point

Want a practical example tutorial?

Project North vs True North

Customize Revision Number

Want to learn about true north and project north?