topic Surface Area of Pipes in Revit MEP Forum

Surface Area of Pipes

arjiZSEUN — Tue, 13 Feb 2024 05:07:37 GMT

I am trying to add surface area parameter (built in parameter) in schedule but it is not appearing. It is showing in the instance parameter but not appearing in schedule. can anyone help me on this ?

Betreff: Surface Area of Pipes

iainsavage — Tue, 13 Feb 2024 14:15:50 GMT

Are you talking about the "Area" parameter?

If so then be aware that I've noticed what I think is an error in that value since it appears to calculate the surface area using the pipe's nominal Size parameter rather than using the actual Outside Diameter.

So on that basis I think it would be safer for you if you created a calculated parameter to calculate the area correctly.

If however you really want to use the built-in Area parameter in a schedule then you would need to use Dynamo to extract values from that parameter and then pass those values to your own shared parameter which can be scheduled.

There are similar posts and solutions with sample Dynamo scripts using the GetParameterValueByName and SetParameterByName nodes.

Here's an example:

(The error warning is because I don't have the custom shared parameter "SurfaceArea" loaded into my sample project - you need to create the Shared Parameter, load it into your project/template and associate it to the Pipes category)

Betreff: Surface Area of Pipes

arjiZSEUN — Sun, 18 Feb 2024 09:30:54 GMT

Thanks for the reply.

I would suggest to use pipe outside diameter for surface area calculations. Since we need outer surface area for heat load calculations rather than nominal Dia.

And regarding dynamo, yes it possible. I do aware of that but it is not dynamic. what in the case someone have changed and published without dynamo. It will be a real mess.

So it is better to have that same parameter in schedule. @Anonymous need to help on this. Till then we can create calculated shared parameter with formulas.

Please let me know if anyone have better strategy.

Betreff: Surface Area of Pipes

iainsavage — Sun, 18 Feb 2024 12:29:07 GMT

If you are not relying on the built-in Area parameter, which as I said gives the wrong(?) value, then you can just create a calculated parameter in your schedule.

For comparison here are values calculated as above and compared with the data extracted from the built-in Area parameter