Getting temporary dimensions to face of stud wall instead of centerline

[Andy1Drafter]

I'm trying to get temporary dimensions to reference from the exterior face or core face. I went to User's Guide and followed the below and tried several different settings but the witness line still centers on the wall.

You can specify the display and placement of temporary dimensions in the design. You can set temporary dimensions to:

• measure from wall centerlines, wall faces, center of core, or core faces
• measure from door and window centerlines or door and window openings

To specify temporary dimension settings:

1. Click Manage tabProject Settings panelSettings drop-downTemporary Dimensions.
2. From the Temporary Dimension Properties dialog, select the appropriate settings.
3. Click OK.

Why would you want a witness line centered on a wall anyway? That's pretty useless in wood frame construction.

[Alfredo_Medina]

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@Andy1Drafter wrote:

I'm trying to get temporary dimensions ...

Why would you want a witness line centered on a wall anyway? That's pretty useless in wood frame construction.

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Maybe because there are many users who do not work on wood frame construction, which explains why Revit provides a dialog box , so that every user can specify his or her preferences.

[paul]

I have the setting to wall core, but it always goes to face or centre line.... ;-(

When i insert the wall its core face, then go back to say chech its location, aligning witness lines to core doesnt work, dragging blue grip...

Must be missing something, cant see what though.

I have the settings as mentioned in thread above to wall core.

[Alisder.Brown]

As Alfredo said, not everyone in the world uses wood frame walls. This is very useful for block work or conc. walls or for internal walls spacing. 

And yes, the method you stated will change where the default temporary dimensions will show up when you select a wall after placement, assuming you have made your wall correctly then you should have no problems. You can however manually move the witness lines of your temp dimensions.

When you select a wall and the temp dimension shows up, you will see a small blue grip on both witness lines, you can click and hold on this grip and relocate it onto another face by hovering the mouse over where you want it to be referencing.

[karl]

Only a drafter that's never been on a construction site for more that 20-minutes would say something like that.

Wood framing accounts for an IMMENSE amount of construction in North America and no framer on this planet is going to snap lines to the centerline of any wall - they snap lines to the face of the stud, which is what YOU should be doing when you design a building, and what your contruction drawings ought to be showing.

Also, if you have ANY fractions on your wall plans, you don't know what you're doing. A wall plan should be dimensioned to one side of a stud line only, and the designer should be competent enough to locate said stud to account for sheet rock and whatever else has to fit into a space. The only variation from this would be in commercial metal stud construction where NOMINAL wall dimensions SHOULD be used -- again, fractions on a wall plan indicate inexperience.

This is something that, by now, Autodesk should have gotten through their heads

Edited by
Discussion_Admin

[Alisder.Brown]

Karl

Pretty aggressive post, try toning it down a bit.

In regards to your finishing comment... What is wrong with Programmers from India? Indian construction industry is huge, and a vast majority of engineers and extremely skilled tradesmen come from India. They know about proper dimensioning.

And... your wrong, Autodesk did not purely source out for their programmers, a lot of you Americans contributed you know!

Regards

[karl]

I've been using AutoCAD since release 2.2, probably since before you were born...

Programmers from India are good programmers -- but there is a comminucations gap, and a construction technology gap, that cannot be bridged via email.

Anyone that wants to program Revit, or consider themselves a professional architectural tech (with respect to producing construction documents) should be forced to work for a general contractor for 5-years first, so that they develop a true comprehension for what they want to draw, and they begin to understand just what it is that the man in the field actually needs to know, and what he doesn't.

Masonry walls are dimensioned to the face of the masonry - NOMINAL dimensions are used. Wood studs are dimensioned to the face of the stud so the framer doesn't have to divide 3-1/2" or 5-1/2" in the field. Commercial interior walls are dimensioned to the face of the finished wall, using NOMINAL dimensions, not 4-7/8"...

Anyone that thinks a contractor is going to hold to a 1/8" tollerance, simply does not know what they are doing. You cannot even build a wall that is straight or flat to 1/8" across its surface.

I've been seeing this silly argument for too many years. Autodesk ought to hire some folks with real world experience to instruct the programmers on what to program.

[Cambot70]

I agree. When I was in architecture school we had a semester class devoted entirely to construction methods. That summer, I worked on the crew building a house for the construction professor -- a terrific learning experience.

I share your frustrations with Revit. I'm also a long time Autocad user and Revit is a big improvement in many ways but sadly deficient in many others. I'd love to find (or create) a forum or website for people to discuss things that need to be improved in Revit and then find a way to communicate that to Autodesk.

[Cambot70]

I forgot to ask -- how do you set dimension parameters so that dimensions go to the exterior face of the wall -- which is what I need in the project I'm working on now. I do agree with dimensioning to the outside of stud, but I'm not doing construction drawings at the moment.  I read the Revit Help article and it doesn't seem to apply to Revit 2016 -- it asks me to go to a dropdown that does not seem to exist in 2016 version.

[loboarch]

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@Cambot70 wrote:

I forgot to ask -- how do you set dimension parameters so that dimensions go to the exterior face of the wall -- which is what I need in the project I'm working on now. I do agree with dimensioning to the outside of stud, but I'm not doing construction drawings at the moment.  I read the Revit Help article and it doesn't seem to apply to Revit 2016 -- it asks me to go to a dropdown that does not seem to exist in 2016 version.

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Can you post a link to the help documentation you are saying is out of date with 2016?  I am not aware of any changes, but if i know the topic you are fefering to I cna either change it to be correct or clarify what it is describing.

[DeanMellinger]

So true.

Nothing like using software that requires you to get into the 'mind' of a programmer.

[ToanDN]

I found no problems dimensions a wall to its core faces, finish faces, core center, or wall center. The program gives you enough options whether you are a proud grandpa doing an immense amount of wood sheds or a young pr!ck not knowing what to do. There are shortcomings but this is not one of them.

[karl]

It is people like you that keep me employed because when your boss is waiting for you to get a wall intersection to close while his client is threatening to sue him, he calls me to get your work finished for you, and that is why I only have to work 6-months a year.

Not bad for a grandpa huh?

New get back to work - unless you are a college professor or drafting instructor that doesn't have to meet a deadline or a budget - and when all you Revit groupies are crying about your paychecks (because your productivity is non-existent and your boss is dumping money into software that makes your job take longer to do), come back and read this thread again.

[ToanDN]

I think you got it wrong. It's the people like me who keep others employed because we are able to answer to other peoples' questions that help them get the work done. On the other hand, bragging about your decades of existence and experiences within your limited field of work do not provide any value to others. Furthermore, it's laughable when literally everything you said about others is based on assumption without even a tiny bit of fact about them.

I live to see most people getting old become wiser but some just becoming bitter. So sad.

[karl]

Son,

No one on this planet should have to come to an internet forum in order to figure out how to set Revit to dimension to the face of studs.

Here endith the lesson.

[ToanDN]

There is nothing wrong with seeking assistance from others for something you don't know how to accomplish, whether it be an internet forum or a senior assisted living center. It only wrong if you use these places for whining instead of asking.

Also, did you read that I could dimension to the face of studs rather easily? I hope you are not suffering from memory loss, or worse, reading comprehension problems. But if you are, that's fine. I can understand.

[chrisplyler]

I'm a commercial/industrial construction project manager and arch/mech/elect/plumb designer/draftsman and have been for twenty-six years.

I have personally NEVER done anything with wood framing. Now I do plenty of metal stud framing, so I do understand your point, but it is NOT some universally "better" default to have built into Revit.

And sometimes I have fractions because I can't always just put walls exactly where I want them to be. Sometimes there are owner-driven requirements. Sometimes ADA requires certain spacing around a fixture, but doesn't account for partitions between fixtures. Sometimes you're using gyp thickness other than 1/2", and you want whole 4' wide sheets to fit without trimming, and so at least one dimension in the room (assuming dimensions to stud face) will not be a nice round inch number. Sometimes your interior walls being nice round whole inch numbers will drive the exterior edge of concrete to be an annoying fractional dimension, so you just let one of your interior walls be fractional instead.

[karl]

I've seen a lot of things in my 35-years of doing this (which includes working with AutoCAD since release 2.2), and I have seen a lot of people that really do think that they know what they're doing, but designing a room around the size of a piece of gypsum board to save 1/2" of gypsum board is a new one on me.

Nevertheless, this conversation is about how a program could be so anti-intuitive that a drafter has to get on an internet forum to figure out how to get his program to dimension to the face of a stud...

But hey, as long as you feel cool producing a 3D model that really isn't doing anything for you, have at it.

[chrisplyler]

My models do a lot for me. I am a design/build contractor. I do as you describe most of the time, but sometimes there is reason for a fractional dimension. That's all I'm saying. It's insulting for you to say that anyone who ever uses a fractional dimension doesn't know what they're doing.

I personally hate when architects use nominal 5" dimensions for walls that are 4-1/2" or whatever. Because I'm the contractor. I've got to build the thing. I've got to make an ADA compliant restroom and half the time the architect "nominals" me out of half an inch or something because he doesn't think. Then when you send him an RFI explaining that he can't take the 1/2" out of the electrical room because of code required working space in front of electric panels, and he can't take it out of the mechanical room because of the fan coil units' required working clearances, and so the only place he can take it is out of the executive's corner office...and what does he want us to do...he gets upset (oh no...no way is the executive going to tolerate a 1/2" smaller office) and causes construction delays. Okay, this doesn't happen all THAT often, but it DOES happen.

What I like to do is dimension stud walls to one side of the stud or the other like you said...but my walls are actual thickness and I can use interior-face-to-interior-face dimensions only where there is a critical reason to do so...like ADA compliant spacing of stuff, code required or equipment manufacturer required spacing of stuff, etc.

Once had an architect explain to me that I should have known that the true exterior dimension (out-of-steel to out-of-steel) of his pre-engineered metal building design should have really been something other than what his plans showed. I'm not kidding. He did it after I sent him pre-engineered bldg manufacturer submittal/shop drawings.

BTW... I don't design a room based on that 1/2" of gypsum. But I've met design/build guys that do, and they have a valid reason. Not a reason I've found compelling enough to do it myself, but a valid one nevertheless.

xtn

[karl]

When designing for ADA a designer can move a wall 1/2" to get to a whole-inch dimension and have a 1/2" safety factor built-in to their design. When designing for ADA you should always add an inch or two anyway, just to be safe and to prevent the guy in a wheelchair with a tape measure suing you for 5-million dollars because you are a 1/2" off - same holds true for Electric Panel clearances.

Nominal dimensions for metal stud walls in commercial construction (5/8" gyp bd ea side of 3-5/8" mtl studs (4-7/8")) a "5-inch" wall, for instance, means the wall can float inside the 5-inches, and still be good. Its gets tricky with 6" metal studs because the nominal should be a whole number so there is more float, but I wouldn't cry over 7-1/2" showing up on a dimension plan -- but a GOOD DESIGNER can think through this, and SHOULD.

4" and 6" dimension on a floor plan for walls in a wood framed structure are a relic from when wood studs were ACTUALLY 4", or 6", and that just shows you how stubborn some folks are.

Obviously these are brief replies but I am not writing essays about this because people are going to do what they want to do anyway.

You can justify anything today if your goal is not to hurt anyone's feelings - I ain't like that.