Revit MEP Piping Content For Sale from Andekan

Found a content provider (Andekan) that has a library of plumbing piping fittings - these are NOT free, but are available for purchase. I haven't downloaded any of this to test for accuracy, but if you're looking for this content and are willing to pay for it, here's the link:

http://www.andekan.com/revit-families-buy-and-download-content-packs

These guys were formerly with Broutek, and founded this company a couple of years ago. They have content for Charlotte Pipe cast iron and plastic, Nibco, American Standard and more.

If you purchase any of this, please let us know what you think -

thanks - David B.

AU and Certification

Autodesk is planning on offering free associate and professional level certification exams at AU this year, for the following products:

AutoCAD
Inventor
Civil 3D
Revit Architecture
3D Studio Max Design

There will be exams for both 2009 and 2010 available. If you're not going to be able to make AU, you can still take the exams at any one of our ATC sites (for a nominal fee). If you're trying to add to the resume, and make yourself more marketable to potential employers, this is an easy way to do it. And if you're an employer, a certified professional in any one of the products gives you a good idea of their skill level, whether looking for new employees or testing existing ones.

At the ATC Summit at AU this year, I'll be speaking for a few minutes during the first part of the meeting about how ASI is taking advantage of this program to help our clients, so if you're in the ATC program, I'll see you there!

later - David B.

Editing the Size of the Tick Marks on Pipe Fittings

While messing around trying to create my pipe flanges, I've been opening and editing the generic fittings family. One of the parameters in these parts includes the tick mark size. By default it's a formula:

Tick Mark: Fitting Outside Diameter * 0.4

To make the tick mark smaller, change the mutliplier to a smaller value, i.e. 0.2 - this will make the tick mark shorter than what shows up by default. You'll need to make this change on any of the fittings you're using, so edit each type - to change, use project browser, go to families, go to pipe fittings, right mouse click on the fitting family and pick Edit. When the family is open, select Type on the far right side of the ribbon. Change the value in the formula and then pick OK. Next, use Load into Project to load it into your current project or template, and make sure you choose the Override family type and parameters option, to make sure the value is updated.

Try it out - and see if it makes your plumbers happier!

thanks - David B.

Revit MEP - Victaulic Pipe Library

I'm all for more accuracy in the Revit MEP model, and Victaulic has made this much easier in regards to creating grooved piping layouts. They've created Revit .RFA families and lookup tables for fittings, valves, etc. and posted them on their website. So if you're looking at grooved piping for IPS, fire protection and more, check out this website:

http://www.victaulic.com/content/autodeskrevit.htm

I've downloaded the whole thing, and will be testing them out on my next project.

Check it out - David B.

Having Fun with Flanged Duct

Been working a bit with contractors that need a more accurate representation of duct. One client is needing flanged duct system, so I ran a little experiment. I created a union from scratch (since the one that came with the program didn't really represent a true union - no union is solid, it's a void).  I created a simple solid rectangular form with a void in the middle. Next I added reference planes for the height, width and thickness of the the connection. After these were defined and dimension parameter labels added, I added a flange dimension parameter. All of these were instance based.

So here's what it looks like in the family:

So, in a plan view, you get this - the union breaks the duct, and places the flanged fitting in place of the split, provided the duct type specifies this fitting:

And since the fitting has a void in it, the end of duct or section through duct shows the rise drop style correctly:

Thinking beyond just a union, you should be able to add the same solid and void geometry to a copy of the plain end fittings the program has included, to create a better representation of the duct - which shoudl substantially help when it comes to coordination and interference issues in tight spaces.

Next - parametric duct and pipe hangers....

Thanks - David B.

Location for the Revit MEP Books...

Since I've been getting some requests for the new advanced book, I needed to make sure it was easy to find, so here's the link:

http://www.clickhereforsolutions.com/estore/asi/c-7-publications.aspx

This will open our publications page, where you can order either the Revit MEP 2010 Fundamentals or Advanced Books. The Advanced book purchase price is $75.00 for single copy. Site license is also available.

thanks - David B.

Found some cool stuff...two good blogs on Revit and IPD, and more...

Gregory Arkin from CADD Centers of Florida has a nice little article on Revit history I found while doing some research for a meeting today:

http://bimboom.blogspot.com/2007/02/revit-history_11.html

He also had a link to the Tony Isenhoff's BIM and IPD blog, which has a link to the Penn State BIM Execution Planning Guide...very interesting reading, nicely written - thanks to both of these guys for these informative posts!

Tony Isenhoff's Blog:
http://bimandipd.blogspot.com/2009/10/bim-execution-planning-guide-developed.html

Penn State BIM Execution Planning Guide:

http://www.engr.psu.edu/ae/cic/bimex/index.aspx

Happy Reading!