topic Re: Rotate Legend Component in Revit MEP Forum

Rotate Legend Component

Anonymous — Thu, 01 May 2014 16:36:52 GMT

Is there a way to rotate legend components?

Re: Rotate Legend Component

CoreyDaun — Mon, 05 May 2014 15:00:21 GMT

Nope. Legends are not very MEP-friendly.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

Anonymous — Tue, 06 May 2014 07:47:09 GMT

Thanks. I will create a family for any symbols I need rotating.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

vewright — Sun, 30 Nov 2014 20:42:38 GMT

The question should be,

Why isn't there a way to rotate legend components?

Legends are great, for one reason--you can place a legend on more than one sheet! And that is exactly what you need to be able to do with a legend. However, when I began to use legends, I quickly discovered that dragging a family into a legend view didn't work very well. A few families behave "properly"--that is, you can select the view you want for the legend. Doors work well. But, if you are an MEP designer, you are out of luck in most cases. If you select the front view of a panelboard, for example, it might be the front view, or it might be a side view. Or, you might get a front view with the panelboard lying on its side. If you are lucky, you might just have to select a back view to get a front view.

One of Revit's strengths is that if you change something on one view of the model, it changes in every view, because views are just that--views of a single model. However, it a real design project, you need to have "views" that are not part of the model. For example, an HVAC designer needs to have a schematic view of the HVAC system to show logical relationships that cannot be conveyed in the basic 3D model. A set of electrical drawings needs to include a riser diagram, or a single-line diagram of the electrial systems. It would be very useful to be able to use legend components in these schematic views--you could use a view of a pump, the same pump used in the model, as a symbol in the HVAC schematic diagram, or an elevation view of a panelboard in a riser diagram, instead of searching for suitable symbols, or pulling in a 2D AutoCAD drawing, or any of the other "workarounds" you can find in the various forums.

If you have to use a workaround to accomplish a task, then something is missing from your basic toolbox! You can layout a right angle with a knotted string, but a square is much handier.

Revit needs an "auxiliary" design space. Yes, you can use phases or design options to address some of the tasks mentioned above. However, legends would fill the bill, if they just worked!

Re: Rotate Legend Component

bvm76 — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 08:07:49 GMT

There is no way to rotate a component legend when placed in a legend view. As a workaround, you can use the coarse and medium detail to represent your symbol with the correct orientation in the legend view. Create a two symbols with your 3D family - one for displaying in a project (medium detail) and one for legend view (coarse). Rotate the symbol (to be use in the legend) so it will display correctly. This means you need to use coarse detail to all your symbols in legend view.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

vewright — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 13:59:36 GMT

I am always glad to see a response to a post. However, this is a workaround,
not a solution. If you could rotate legend components, you could use legends
for details, schematic diagrams, etc. Admittedly, this approach would allow
you to do that, but with more work and the limitation of having to use the
coarse detail level. Another, related, limitation is that not all six views
are available in all families. This is probably due to the number of views
defined in the family, but it is still a limitation.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

bvm76 — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 15:50:05 GMT

The intention of this workaround is to have the symbol for legend use and if this can be use for other purposes then that's a bonus. For me, creating a dedicated symbol for legend to show up correctly in legend view will only take a little time compared to the benefit you can get from it. I prefer to have a symbol that represents the families loaded/used in a project (where possible) rather than a dummy symbol.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

tom_durfee — Tue, 27 Mar 2018 22:44:28 GMT

Load the Annotation Symbol into the project, then you can drop it in your Legend view or directly in a sheet, rather than the 'device'.

You'll have to 'extract' it from the family, which is easy, but could be tedious for many families.

Select the family, Edit, select the symbol, edit, load into project (not the device family).

You may have to manually enter text; for instance if you had the text linked to the device's "Symbol Label" - ie- [CR] for card reader.

edit... a few minutes later...

Also, I've just discovered you can insert an image into a schedule, so I'm testing; may hit another roadblock along the way

- edit the annotation symbol, zoom all the way into the symbol resize the revit application window so it's the same shape as the symbol, export as image, fiddle with the settings to your liking but make sure to check "Visible portion of current window", *set the destination folder*, save,

- then in your schedule add Image as a parameter, then for each row you can load the images.

Now you're at the mercy of the family or shared parameters in your schedule, so use them to enter all the data for the schedule; rather than entering raw text. - Does this seem to be best practice for future use?

{Revit 2017}

Re: Rotate Legend Component

tom_durfee — Tue, 27 Mar 2018 22:50:05 GMT

^ ... AND/OR load the image into the family/type so its there for the next project.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

Anonymous — Thu, 25 Jun 2020 16:37:58 GMT

This is a bit of an outdated post, but I have found that most families that are oriented incorrectly are primarily a result of how they were modeled, such as being model in a view where top is actually front because the host is oriented as a floor. Simple workaround is to load such family into a new family that is orientated properly, front is actually front, and then load into a project, solves the orientation issue without recreating families or messing around with annotations. But may have to create a few parameters for size adjustments if needed.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

trey.ruiz — Tue, 07 Jul 2020 15:33:55 GMT

Another solution here could be to create two copies of the Generic Annotation within the family, one for the floor plan, and one for the legend. Two instance parameters can be created, one set for true as default, and the other set to the formula as the "not" of the first parameter.

For additional protection, I then used Rush Forworth to make the parameters hidden so the parameter is not used in the model.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

nathaniel.mcmahon — Thu, 14 Jan 2021 10:11:49 GMT

How about a little dropdown toggle that lets you select legend display orientation Autodesk? I mean really, finish what you've started.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

jdcarlingJQBC3 — Wed, 07 Jul 2021 19:30:18 GMT

no rotating a component is bad .... not being able to tag it is worse.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

RyanBradley_JACOBS — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 01:02:43 GMT

the solution here is not a solution at all. booo. fix it autodesk

Re: Rotate Legend Component

RobDraw — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 01:16:52 GMT

Maybe, but it is still a valid statement.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

RyanBradley_JACOBS — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 01:32:03 GMT

Agreed RobDraw! The user communities amazing creativity and problem solving ability is why we all keep coming back to these forums! it's just a shame Autodesk have historically been so slow at fixing fundamental workflows.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

madonna.saliba — Thu, 11 May 2023 06:05:20 GMT

This worked for me, since all my sheet views are in fine mode, and the legend component detail level can be selected separately for each item, thank you.

Re: Rotate Legend Component

jim.somersBKPB5 — Sun, 23 Jun 2024 15:55:06 GMT

Why anyone gives a penny to Autodesk is beyond me. I could do this faster and better in MS paint. Are the devs for Revit even conscious?

Re: Rotate Legend Component

jgatlinPSHCD — Tue, 12 May 2026 16:29:00 GMT

FEI - The original post is on 5/5/2014 and my post on it is now 05/12/26, 12 years later. That is $40,800 for one user, now imagine the bank roll of an average 2.5 million users worldwide that also do not have a solution. This post in no way is solved by Autodesk and should be un-checked, so the team knows that this is NOT consistent to how every other object can be rotated. Honestly, to make a symbol for every wall type is not the way at all if we have components. Their sales team along with their partners, ATG, IMagine. ETC. will say this software will make you faster as driving bullet point for sale. Below is the math and estimate of cost according to ChatGPT for the amount of money given over the past 12 years and not have a solution.

One user for 12 years will have an estimated cost of $40,800 ,multiply that number with their total Revit users (from Autodesk's own website 2.5 million worldwide) and you find that AD made 102 BILLION dollars ($120,000,000,000)and they could not spare any of it to fix this and other small functions that need to be updated over the years.

I often question how Autodesk and the Revit team are helping us these days? Ever since the Autodesk convention with Ryan Reynolds, Revit has done nothing for the user but flashy generative design tools that are incomplete and AI that is no smarter than a highschooler CAD tech. Items like this make it really hard to defend to principals when they seek consistence, but their software does not. The whole software does not seem consistent or complete, and Autodesk is relying on the user to create a work around that will cost a company on their ROI to make symbols of every wall type we use. I honestly, feel Autodesk prioritizes the investors (I am an Investor) wants (money) over the men and women who use this software as a tool (Faster Production).

Moving forward, everyone who has stopped at this page looking for a solution and went past the "daunting work around of symbols and line work" and want to hold Autodesk accountable for an actual solution should help the community by leaving a comment with the original date of question and current date that you are seeking a solution in the comments then post a screen shot of it to LinkedIn and tag Autodesk. Maybe the CEO will see it and realize, that we the user are always fixing Autodesk stupid.