Convert a door family to a generic family?

[Noah]

Ok, here is a strange one, and I am not even sure its possible.  

Our firm is working our way into using Revit, and I have been tasked with testing a few things out. We primarily do residential work, and well the interior doors I have found leave a lot to be desired.  

I did however find one company that has their entire catalog in Revit.  The catch.... they currently only offer their families in a single swing door.  

I have an older set of their families (2014) which included other door types IE double swing, double pocket, pocket slider etc.  The older families allowed you to switch between panel families which were included with the download.  Since that set of families were created they have added new panel styles I would love to use and call out in the plans.  I have contacted the company and asked about more door types, and the answer was that they had plans to add them, but were not sure when.  They switched to the new families about 4 years ago, so I really do not think its a burning press for them.  

The question.  Is there a way to take the new door families, isolate just the panel and all associated parameters, dimensions etc, and place them in a generic family so I can use them with the older family?

I have been able to copy and paste the model components, but it would require me to rebuild the parametrics which would be extremly time consuming. 

Thanks, hopefully this is not too odd of a question. 

I have added one of the older panel files, the older swing door file, and one of their new doors for reference.

[Simon_Weel]

It sounds if you would like to convert all the types of a single Family into a single type / Family. What you could do is import the source family into a project. Then delete all types but one. Rename that Family, import the source again, delete all types again etc. Then you'll  end up with x Families with a single type. 

[RyanCameron]

Just to add what Simon is suggesting, realize that its possible you may lose some functionality if you change the source door family into a generic model category.  If you convert a nested family from a door object to a generic one, the main family will still need to be a door family in order to schedule properly.  In other words, careful in what order you're doing this in. Cheers,

[Noah]

If I am understanding you correctly, I do not think that will get what I am after.  Basically what I need to do is to isolate and separate the door panel from the door family, and place it within a generic family so that I can nest it within the "parent" door family.  

If you look at the 3 family files I uploaded. There is what I could call "parent" family, a "door panel" family which work together.  in the "Parent" family you can swap out the "door panel" family with others that were provided by the company, they have since moved away from that and only offer a single swing family.  I need to isolate just the panel within that single swing family so that I can use it with the "parent" family as the original family was created.  

I am calling the "parent" family the file labeled door-truestile-single-swing.rfa

The panel is the file labeled fl1020.rfa

and the door I am trying to isolate the panel from is door-trustile_doors-fl400.rfa

Thanks!

[RyanCameron]

Sounds similar to how we do doors where I work.  We use something like this when we have a specific view where maybe we're removing the door panel in construction, but leaving the frame in place.

[barthbradley]

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@Noah wrote:

The question.  Is there a way to take the new door families, isolate just the panel and all associated parameters, dimensions etc, and place them in a generic family so I can use them with the older family?

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Older Family? Do you mean use them in an older version of Revit?  Or do mean use them in a different family? 

If the former, Revit isn't backward compatible, but you could get the model geometry into an older Version via Export to IFC. But this wouldn't export dimension, etc. 

If the latter, why not save the Door Family to a different name (SAVE AS), delete everything in it except for panel, change the Category, save it and then load that Family into the "older" Door Families? 

[Noah]

There are two different versions of how they produced their revit family.  

The older version allowed you to swap out door panels, so they gave you the parent family, and a library of door panels, you could load into your drawing and swap through the type editor.  

At some point in the last few years they did away with that method and released newer families with only a single swing door and no swapable panels. So I am limited to only single swing doors, meaning no double doors, no pocket or sliders at all.  

Take a look at the files I included with one of my previous posts, it may clear up the confusion. 

[Noah]

I think this is more on the line of what they were accomplishing. 

The base family allowed you to swap the panels out, so say you want a 6 panel door instead of a louvered or 4 panel door, you can do that by loading the panel family from their library you wanted, and set it as the panel in the family. 

I need to find a way to isolate the panels from their new door families that do not have this "hot swapable" panel.  

[Simon_Weel]

Ok, then I got it wrong. I had a look at the families and I don't think it's as easy as it looks at first glance. It's a bunch of nested families within nested families. While it's pretty easy to pick out a door family from the new parent, like type TS3000, but using this family in another family isn't going to work as-is. The whole thing is parameter-driven so you'll have to figure out what parameter does what and then link it to parameters in the existing family - if at all.

What I tend to do in such a case is open the family of the door I would like to incorporate into an existing family, then open the existing family, pick a door in that family, create a copy and then model that existing door to resemble the new door. That won't break any parameters if done correct.

[Noah]

That was what I was afraid of.  I guess what I will have to do is to keep using their older library of panels choosing the closest match, and specify the panel model number in the door schedule.  As you could see, the newer panels do seem more complex, which may be why they moved away from the original style of family, which I think was brilliant in terms of flexibility.  

I will keep my eyes open to see if someone else has any possibility of a workaround.  

[barthbradley]

So the idea is to nest only the panels of the door types from one family into the other family that uses the Family Types Parameter to swap out Panels?  If so, that's doable.  You would need to convert it to a non-hosted family, delete the extraneous geometry, and change the insertion point to match the other Panels that are available in the Family Types. 

[Noah]

Yes! that is exactly what I am trying to do.  But I lack the deeper understanding of families to accomplish that goal.  How do I convert it to a non hosted family?  I have tried a few things, but I just cannot get the wall / frame etc. to delete.  

BTW, you guys are awesome, thank you for taking time out of your day to attempt to help me.

[barthbradley]

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@Noah wrote:

Yes! that is exactly what I am trying to do.  But I lack the deeper understanding of families to accomplish that goal.  How do I convert it to a non hosted family?  I have tried a few things, but I just cannot get the wall / frame etc. to delete.  

BTW, you guys are awesome, thank you for taking time out of your day to attempt to help me.

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You know, I'm working through it now. It's a challenge.  The part of the process that I mentioned above was easily accomplished, but that's not all that needs to be done to make it flex properly in the Host Family. 

 

[Noah]

What is the process for the first part?  I think if I can get through that first part, it would give me a good start towards my goal as well as give me something to do after my wife and kids go to bed lol.  

[barthbradley · Accepted solution]

To convert a family to non-hosted:

1. Recategorize the Wall-Hosted Door Family as Air Terminal

2. Open a New Project

3. Load and place the Wall-Hosted "Air Terminal" Family on a Wall in the New Project.

4. Save and close this Project.

5. Open a New Project.

6. Link in that Project you saved in step 4.

7. Go to Collaborate tab and press Copy/Monitor and then select Link.

8. Press Copy and select the Wall-Hosted "Air Terminal" Family in the Link

9. While still in Copy/Monitor, select the Wall-Hosted "Air Terminal" Family in the Project Browser, right-click and select Edit Family. 

10. In the Family, delete the Host Wall and then Recategorize the Family to Door. 

Now you have a non-hosted Door Family.  The Projects from which you created it can be discarded. These Projects have served their purpose. 

[barthbradley]

Ha! I'm typing too much. I should have just posted this: 

Convert a Hosted Family to Face-Based or Non-Hosted Family in Revit | Revit 2019 | Autodesk Knowledg...

[Noah]

I will give that a try this evening!  Thank you soo much for the help.  I think I might be able to figure out the flexing part (being optimistic)  I might be able to pair down the options they have built into those panels and leave that for the builders to worry about when ordering doors.  So once I have the panels isolated, simplifying it may work.  

Thank you again! you just made my day much better 🙂

[barthbradley]

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@Noah wrote:

I think I might be able to figure out the flexing part (being optimistic)  

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Oh, it can definitely be done.  I just lost steam.  Besides, if I did it, I'd rob you of all the fun of doing it yourself. 

That's my story and I'm sticking with it. 😉     

[Noah]

I really appreciate the help.  I will mark it as the answer.  I have been using Revit for years, mainly as a presentation modeling tool, but we are starting to get smore serious about the potential of producing our construction documents with Revit as well.  So, now I have to dig deeper into areas where I had only dipped my toes into and I am having a BLAST doing so.  

Again, thank you!

[Noah]

I just wanted to say thank you again! I played around with it tonight and got about 90% there.  I have it working with the "parent" family in every way except the offset in the wall, which I will figure out tomorrow evening. The whole process is a bit more involved than what I was initially thinking, but I suspect when we get the initial set of doors we want to use converted connecting the constraints we need connected between the two families will be all that is needed.