Revit Hints & Hacks: Is your family too high?

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When creating Revit families one thing that may need to be considered is how to get something to show up in a plan view when it is placed above the cut plane. Consider the plight of the wall shelf or, in this example, the wall mounted stand. This can also go for windows, wall sconces, brackets, casework, or anything else in your model that is completely above the cut plane. When something is above the Primary Range Cut plane completely then it will not be seen in a plan view. All you need is a part of the family model to be below the Primary Range Cut plane to have it show up.

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With Plan view on the left and an elevation on the right, we can see how this family can still be seen in plan view at 47” AFF. At a height of 48” AFF it is no longer visible in plan view.

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Back to the family to set it up to have visibility in the plan views. Open the Front view. Add a Reference Plane 48” below the Ref. Level. You can do more if your family will be higher than 8’ from the floor. The consideration is to give enough distance to the reference plane so that it will be below the Primary Range Cut plane. Like all Reference Planes should have, give this Reference Plane a name, I use Line all the time. I also recommend that the Reference Plane be set to Not a Reference. It does not need to be selectable to pick or dimension to.

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Open the Ref. Level view. On the Create tab get Model Line. Select <Invisible lines> as the Subcategory: to use.

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Stop by the bar, the Options Bar that is, and select the Placement Plane:  to be the one named Line that you created.

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Draw a line, ¼” or so, that will be on that lower Reference Plane that was named Line that is 48” below the Ref. Level for your family.

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Reload the family and it will now be seen in the plan view if something “Model” is below the Primary Range Cut plane.

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Donnia Tabor-Hanson aka CADMama

 

 

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