Rotation Parameter within A family problems

[mattieb]

I'm modelling a parapet post family for one of our structures.

The Posts are always vertical

However the rails & Rail guides will be at a rotation which follows the structure - This is where I am struggling.

I want add a rotation parameter which makes the rail guide (which is an extrusion) rotate about it's centre.

The Rail seat extrusion is created on a reference plane (Named top rail rotation). When I rotate this reference plane the rail rotates with it - I need to set up a parameter for this to enter a value for the rotation.

I have attached the family if anyone would like to look at it (I'm using revit 2014)

Thankyou all 

[mattieb]

Ignore the above post; I have solved it. 

I had to start with it rotated 2 degrees from vertical, then I could add the amgle annotation & turn it into a parameter.

I was going wrong by trying to rotate about a horizontal plane (+90deg) which just didn't work.

I'm new to revit so pretty proud of this achievment  

[mattieb]

I'm a failure.

I thought I'd cracked it...... but......

I Now have the rail seats able to Rotate, but they are not rotating about the axis of the centre of the seat.

So my question is: How do you make this reference plane rotate about it's own central axis??

[kmalawski]

You're not a failure Mattieb, experimenting with families in this way only expands your knowledge of the software. 

That said, I'm not able to take a look at the family right now, but I did have this issue before with rotating a north arrow I made. If you align the item to be rotated to a ref line and add a rotation parameter from that line to a pinned ref plane, it should rotate about the center of the connection between the two.

Sorry I can't explain it in more depth right now, but that solved this problem for me in the past. I hope it helps!

-Kevin

[ndsmaug]

kmalawski, I would like to know more about that because I'm currently trying to give a rotation parameter to a North Arrow and I can't seem to make it work...AT ALL.  I have started with a generic annotation model (It has only reference lines. No ability to have reference planes.).  I have my reference lines locked to a an angular dimension that I have set to be the rotation parameter.  The reference line, of course will rotate when a new input is specified, however, any 2D geometry I try to lock or align and lock to the line either falls apart of a laundry list of "Cannot Constrain" errors erupt.  Can you shed some more light on this?

Thanks!

[David_W_Koch]

Are you using a nested family for the north arrow graphics?  Doing so will allow all of the graphics to be treated as one item, the nested family, and will avoid issues with the rotation breaking constraints internal to the graphics.

[ndsmaug · Accepted solution]

That was exactly the problem!  I just needed to do a nested family and it rotated all the geometry as a single item.  Exept, now it thinks that 90 degrees is straight down instead of up, so it flips my arrow upside down and rotates counterclockwise instead of clockwise...but I'll take it.  Thank you!