Living Wall Example in Revit

I occasionally receive Revit-related questions from professors who use my books in academia. Yesterday I received one concerning performance; a small model around 30 MB. I figured right away it would have something to do with a complex family, and I was right, sorta. The main issue was using Realistic mode in Revit, more on that in a moment, and the number of RPC shrubs placed in the project.

Turns out, the RPC content was being used to create a living wall in an interesting way. This post will show how that was done and talk about a "cure" for realistic mode.

Read on to learn more...

Daylight Factor with Solar Tubes in ElumTools

Here in Minnesota, where I live and work, there is a requirement that all publicly funded projects comply with the B3 program, which is similar to USGBC's LEED program. One of those requirements relates to Daylight Factor. We use ElumTools to run a simulation to derive this value. This post will touch on this more, and a challenge the ElumTools developers helped us overcome!

Read on to learn more...

Revit 2020 - Path of Travel Tool

I posted a link to my AECbytes "What's New" article in the Out There section in RevitFourm.org recently.

Lots of good discussions about the tool, how it works and its limitations... I am sure this V1 feature will be improved to accommodate some of the things discussed, like AHJ (authority having jurisdiction) and codes requiring specific things like all turns be 90 degrees and not going through an electrical room. Jeff Hanson, from Autodesk, has chimed in to respond to a few questions and "set the record straight" comments:)

• BTW, Jeff is also my co-author for this book; Autodesk Revit 2020 Architectural Command Reference

Continue reading to learn more...

Two Revit 2020 Hotfixes

Many firms wait until the first major Update (e.g. 2020.1) or 3-6 months before deploying a new version of Revit into production; that is what I do. For those that have, or want to, jump right in there are two hotfixes you should probably install. One addresses an issue where Revit starts in Viewer Mode and the other has to do with Autodesk 2020 products, in general, not playing well with systems set to hibernate or go to sleep. BTW, hopefully hibernate/sleep mode are common. On a related note, LHB participated in a plug load study that resulted in the following report and info-graph:

• Impacts of office plug load reduction strategies
• Powering down, powering off

Keep reading to learn more about the hotfixes...

Introducing the MEPPP Universal Lighting Fixture Family for Revit

We recently rolled out an updated version of CTC Software's MEP Productivity Pack (MEPPP). One significant development on the electrical side is around lighting fixtures. Over the 8+ years this product has been sold, a lot of customers (electrical engineers and contractors) have requested an un-hosted version of the content. I don't like the idea in principle, and we would almost never use them in our multi-discipline practice here are LHB, but there is always the exception (e.g. architect working in 2D AutoCAD). The main issue deflecting effort in this develop was that we would essential need two families for every fixture; face based and level based (aka un-hosted).

I am happy to report we were able to develop a hosted and un-hosted set fixtures in a single family. It even has a native, non-nested, light source to making modifying the photometry simple and facilitate a smooth workflow for lighting analysis (using ElumTools, for example).

BTW, we have been collaborating with Steven Bunker on this content. A electrical engineer and Revit guru I met in an Autodesk beta meeting! He is fairly active in the Autodesk Forums - click here for that.

Keep reading to learn more...

Phasing Versus Design Options

Quick and simple post today... a reminder for some, and new information for others. The topic is defining the difference between phasing and design options. Read on if you want to learn more...

A Visit to the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)

Earlier this week we took my son, who is a junior in high school, on a college visit to the #1 art school in the USA... the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). Who knows if he will get accepted or if we can afford it, but I suggested we 'shoot for the stars' and see what happens... especially given his passion for art. BTW, he created the mascot for this blog when is we 15.

I decided to share some photos I took from the visit, even though they to not do this campus justice; it has an amazing vibe and immense character. I have a few photos of a quick tour of the RISD school of architecture as well, which I initiated as my son is not interested in following me... which is perfectly fine. Given I am an architect, teach graduate architecture students at NDSU and have the #1 Revit textbook in the USA academic market, you can imagine why I would stop in to say hello:)

Read on to learn more...