Schedule Multiple Corniced Length while using the Cost Parameter as area.

[theblackeagle92]

Hello,

We have a big project filled with classic cornices that are either created on walls, ceilings, or around wall openings. All of our work involves using in-place families to create all the cornices as well as wall finishings in specific part of a wall.

The workflow i'm using to get the cornice length involves dividing the volume of the material (assigned to the cornice) by the area (manually by calculating the area of the cornice profile). And since you cannot add a new parameter to a material I'm using the "cost" parameter as the given area, thus I create this calculated parameters =>

Material: Volume \ Material: Cost \ 1

I use the same method to calculate the area of wall materials by manually assigning the material thickness to the "cost" parameter. This way i'm dividing the volume by the thickness to get the area.

Is there a better workflow to use ?

Thanks in advance.

[martijn_pater]

Hmm, you can schedule a shared instance parameter to a cornice lenght dimension directly with a label?  You can also add instance material parameters fyi. But let me review what's the best method after modelling, since that's the situation probably.

[theblackeagle92]

Thank you for your reply,

The shared instance parameter will be accessed (modified) through the entire in-place family instance and not on individual sweeps\Elements. I wasn't so successful on creating a new material parameter either.

Creating a new parameter from a material takeoff doesn't create a material parameter. This is what I mean.

If there is an entirely another method to easily model those cornices and schedule them I'd be happy to use the new workflow in future projects.

[martijn_pater · Accepted solution]

Just to show how to create/find material parameters, I am not convinced this is the way to go since you'd need to apply a seperate material for each profile used which is sensitive to user input errors.
*note: creates an instance parameter for all materials

[theblackeagle92]

I didn't know you can add a new parameter to a material. I was like:

If there as another method to do this, please tell me.

[martijn_pater]

Also while in edit mode you can add as many shared parameters as you like for scheduling to the in-place model. Also does not strike me as a convincing method though...  still thinking on it...