Revit: Wall type is missing after IFC import

[Anonymous]

Actually this question might concern AutoCAD Architecture or Revit Architecture … I am not quite sure.

The problem is this:

1. In AutoCAD Architecture 2018 I export the model to an IFC file.

2. In Revit Architecture 2018 I import the IFC model

3. Certain internal walls does not seem to be recognized at walls. However they are perfectly visible and selectable in Revit. The "walls" are not associated with a  Level.

 

Any ideas how to fix this? Or is this an AutoCAD Architecture IFC export error?

Regards 

Jan Grenov

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Hi @Anonymous,

zsolt.varga has edited your subject line and embedded a picture for clarity and search engine optimization.
Original: "Wall type is missing after IFC import"

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[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

... found the answer

The wall is actually created as an in-place-family.

Seems af is this is due to some incompability between AutoCAD Architecture and Revit.

Regards

Jan Grenov

[Zsolt.Varga]

Hi @Anonymous,

Thanks for your feedback. 

I am not sure just yet, in which case does Revit convert the wall into an in-place-mass, but I´d be happy to find it out for you. 

If you could send me a sample file where this is happening with at least one wall, while not happening with at least one other wall, that would be helpful for my investigation.

Thanks. 

Regards,

[Anonymous]

Great!

Here is the IFC file.

Do you need the AutoCAD file or the resulting Revit file?

Regards Jan

[Zsolt.Varga]

Hi @Anonymous,

Thanks for your prompt response and the IFC file.

Helpful can be both the rvt and the dwg file - having at least the AutoCAD file would be definitely nice.

Best regards,

[Zsolt.Varga · Accepted solution]

Hi @Anonymous,

In the meantime I managed to talk to one of my colleagues in the related development team. 

I asked him what are the rules for Revit to create an in-place-mass object from an imported IFC wall, this is the answer to that question: 

"Basically, this would be when the walls can’t be translated into Revit’s normal wall concept, which is a vertical extrusion of a shape. There’s no hard and fast rule, because depending on cutouts and inserts and other modifications, the extrusion code might determine when that works or not."

Without seeing the original AutoCAD file, my assumption is, that the wall join definitions in AutoCAD Architecture generate a condition in the geometry which forces Revit to "re-interpret" the object and build it as an in-place-mass in Revit.

I hope this helps.

Regards,

[MichaelWolff]

Sorry to bother this thread again, but it seemed the most appropriate.

The in-place-family walls pose another problem in that they do count as boundaries for rooms. Is there a way to alter that behaviour?

[Anonymous]

Hi @Zsolt.Varga ,  

I have the similar issue with an IFC imported from Tekla. Is there a way I can change that "in-place mass" to a wall? 
It doesn't give me the option to change the family or type. I am trying to avoid re-creating the wall in Revit as it has some weird shape openings. 

[Anonymous]

Hi Michael, 
You should be able to un-tick the "Room Bounding" feature from the properties . At least in my case you can. Please see below photo:

[MichaelWolff]

Thanks and yes, you can. The way I put it, was the wrong way round really.

The wall in my case was made up from different generic models all brought together into one wall type in-place family. While all other (almost) standard walls from the  imported ifc behaved regularly, the individual components of the wall in question were modelled on different levels than the one the room was to go on. These facade-like walls do have the toggle button to be considered a room boundary or not, but that does not work.

To get a glimpse of this behaviour try exporting the golden nugget sample model (Revit 2019 and up) by the German Revit user group into an IFC file and import that into Revit 2017: All the facades look fine but fail to act as room boundaries.

My request was a bit dated and I really did not expect anyone to answer, so I needed to figure out what my initial initiative had been.

[Anonymous]

Hi @Anonymous !

I had the very same problem. I just tried this, and it worked for me. https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/revit-products/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Revit-Reinforcement-bars-from-IFC-exported-from-Tekla-Structures-show-up-as-generic-geometry.html 

[Anonymous]

Hi Zsolt,

So to sum up, is there any way to convert the layers in a model-in-place wall to an actual revit wall type with the corresponding layers in the form of an assembly?

Best,

Garbo

[Zsolt.Varga]

Hi @Anonymous ,

Using the wall-by-face tool might help with that, but I wouldn't expect this approach to take care of all possible geometry of the in-place-mass wall. 
You might find this thread helpful: 
https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/revit-architecture-forum/how-to-edit-my-in-place-mass/td-p/5841422

So my short generic answer would be: 
Probably not without some manual editing, unless you find a way to automate things through Dynamo, that would take care of all possible scenarios. 

(I must admit I always feel very unsure when it comes to say "it cannot be done" - someone might come up with a clever suggestion, that I might have missed)

I hope this helps.

[drumman91]

Kedves @Zsolt.Vargaand others

My two cents:

I found the same results about walls from Archicad's IFC export. I think the main issue is that Revit can oly read the IfcWallStandardCase IFC class. Walls which are exported as IfcWall will not function properly within Revit.

From now the question is:

Can Architects/consultants provide IFC files only with IfcWallStandardCase walls, or can Revit be thought to read IfcWall properly?

Bests,

Péter

[Zsolt.Varga]

Hi Péter, 

Thank you for your feedback!

I wasn't sure about the answer regarding your concerns, so I went on and reached out to one of my colleagues in the Revit IFC development team to gather some more information - this is what he said: 

"Revit should be able to import both IfcWallStandardCase as well as IfcWall. The issue maybe due to something with the IfcWall coming out from ArchiCAD in this case that we may not handle it well for some reason. If there is test model that shows this, it will be helpful for us to find out the issue."

I'd like to encourage you to create a support case for the team, referring to my answer in this very forum thread, so that we can investigate the issue in more details. 

Thanks again for your understanding and collaboration!

Best regards, 

[Matthew.Mallett]

Hi was there a solution to this as I have the same problem with walls from Archicad, and consequently they do not allow families to be hosted on them.

Regards

Matt

Electrical Engineer

[drumman91]

Hi Zsolt,

Thank your for your follow-up!

I asked the Architects to provide some IFC files for testing.

IFC #1 shows that the 2 walls which are classified under IfcWall creates the “bug”: Walls in Revit have no type - only the ones which are falling under IfcWall. Additionally, the Doors which are connected to these walls, are not visible at the reference floor, but they are visible on the floor below – quite odd behavior.

In IFC #2 architects remodeled one wall, which somehow became IfcWallStandardCase, after their export. After this change, that specific wall and the related doors work fine.

The 1st outcome of this exercise is that Architects can probably resolve this issue by changing their model - if they have enough HR workforce to make this happen. But 2ndoutcome is still that Revit has some problems with IfcWalls.

Zsolt, could you pass the IFC files to the IFC development team to, to find out, whether it’s an export problem of Archicad (in this case there are some bugs in the IFC itself) or it’s an import problem of Revit as it can’t process IfcWall class properly? Our annual subscription for updates was terminated last year, therefore I can’t raise a support case. Your help would be very appreciated!

Bests, Peter

[nfrere]

Hello,

I have tried it with REVIT 2020 and an IFC File and we have always this problem not only this problem with classified elements in IfcWall but also with IfcRoof or IfcSlab (perhaps also with others...)

Best regards,

Nicolas