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Convert In-Place Families

Convert In-Place Families

Kind of surprised this hasn't showed up here yet.

Can we get a built-in function to turn In-place families into "real" .rfa s?

Luke has a method posted on his blog

http://whatrevitwants.blogspot.com/2011/07/save-in-place-family-as-rfa-for-use-in.html

But it's complicated enough I can't see regular users doing that.  Much easier for them to just Copy/Paste an In-Place and trash up their model with 80 unique families!

 

If they would have a tool to simply select an In-Place and pick "Save As Family", we could have much leaner models!

12 Comments
pieter1
Advisor

Wanted to add to comments about this:

 

- When converting an in-place family to a component family, I'd like to have the option to pick the basepoint on creation. One of the big downsides of the current workflow is that the basepoint of converted in-place families seem to be the project basepoint, which is almost never what you want.

 

- Once converted to a component family, I'd be helpful that Revit would replace the in-place family in the project with the newly created .rfa

 

- And especially: it would be so helpful if the opposite action would exist (convert an .rfa into an in-place model). That way we could start of a design as an inplace model, convert it to component family to get better performance/less chances for corruption and then if we ever need to redesign it, we could still convert it back to a unique in-place element.

bill_gilliss
Collaborator

I see that the blog post referenced above no longer exists. Here's what it said, with some slight additions from me:

 

To convert a one-of-a-kind Model-in-place object into a reusable Family:

  1. Click the model in-place.
  2. Select “Edit In-place.”
  3. Select all the pieces.
  4. Use Modify > Create > Group (shortcut is GP) and give it a useful name.
  5. Please ensure you are still in 'Model In-place" mode (you are currently editing In-place), then use File > Save As > Library > Group and navigate to the folder where you want to save the Family. You can accept that the family will have the same name as the Group, or give it a new one.
  6. When done click the green “Finish Model” checkmark. You can now load the family from disk into the current or other projects.

Notes:
If you used voids to carve into any of the solid pieces in the In-Place component, you will need to edit the new Family in the Family Editor and use the Modify > Geometry > Cut tool to re-establish what is being cut from what.

 

While in the Family Editor, you'll also often have to move the objects to be in the correct relationship to the Family basepoint (the intersection of the X and Y reference planes).

Intuos5
Advisor

This would be very useful to convert in-place sketch profiles for sweeps (with dimension constraints to reference planes) to a profile sketch. The sweep already contains an origin point, so I see no reason not to allow a conversion.
There should be a dialog to confirm to remove any relations with geometry outside the in-place profile.

Pesch-Konopka
Explorer

In-Place models are great to create something on the spot. Especially when using a pointcloud as reference. But one risks to have too many In-Place Models in a project, undermining the BIM systematics. So if one can easily export an In-Place model to a family, that would improve Revit by far.

Shane_Fitz
Enthusiast

I have a relatively simple process for this and if I could automate it it would save me a lot of time. 

 

Start editing the in place model.

Group everything within the editor.

Name group.

Save group as family.

Finish editing and load the new family into the model. 

 

The new family usually needs some edits to rejoin volumes, cut any voids, assign subcategories, etc. 

mhiserZFHXS
Advisor

Or just plan ahead and model elements as families in the first place.

Shane_Fitz
Enthusiast

That's not a particularly helpful comment.  If that were an option in all circumstances, nobody would have had to come up with these workarounds. 

Mark_Engwirda
Collaborator

Sometimes you create that in-place family only to realise that it has further potential down the track so I think this is a good idea, the words simply export and in-house family as a family is the operative in this case.

 

Kevin.Bell
Advisor

I don't really understand why any in place families cannot be simply opened as loadable families - as you say this would make life a lot easier...

Beltman-SvG
Contributor
  1. What I do is create a model in place.
  2. Select all elements I want to use for a family.
  3. Create a generic model family
  4. paste the 3D geometry
  5. Save as the family to get a proper family name
  6. Go back to the project and close the model in place
  7. Insert the family.

This procedure allows you to transform a model in place to a family but it could be made more user friendly.

The error message that you can't copy between a family and a project is very misleading. You can copy between families and projects but only from the same type of views. 3D to 3D and 2D to 2D. Would be helpfull if that would be more clear.

 

pascal_deleeuw
Enthusiast

After creating an in-place element make it possible to create a Family of elements in the Category in which it is made. For a better and faster workflow it should be nice to have. Also to minimize te size of the project.

Tags (6)
jordicunillperea
Enthusiast

you can actually do it now, using a group inside the in-place component.  It's quite simple:

- create an in-place component

- make some objects and group them

- from the project browser, find that group, right-click on it, and save as RFA

 

that's it!

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