Prefabricated Wood Roof Trusses

[KimSwoboda]

What would be the best way to model prefab. wood roof trusses (Gable trusses, 2x4 or 2x6 framing, 6/12 slope, 12" heel, 2'-0" soffit extension). We have been simply laying out the trusses using detail lines since the fabricator will design and lay out the framing on their shop drawings anyway. However we now have architects that want the trusses all modeled. We are a small structural consulting firm and are main clients are architects. With the different hip, valley and ridge lines we could easily have over a hundred different truss types. Just curious what others are doing when it comes to Roof Framing with prefab. wood trusses. Thanks in advance for any input offered.

[ToanDN]

Have you looked in the Revit's Structural Trusses library to get one similar to what you need and modify it?

[KimSwoboda]

I've modified a truss family but the main issue is that every truss, jack etc. that is different would need to be modeled individually. On a large project with many different hips, valleys, etc. that can amount to over a hundred different types. Then if the architect makes a change later down the line you would need to individually modify the effected truss type again.Seems like there should be a more efficient way of modeling the roof framing but if so I'm not sure what it is. Mainly I'm curious how others are modeling their roof framing for wood trusses. Thanks for your reply.

[ToanDN]

I don't expect to have a one size fit all family but it's possible to have a one parametric family for similar configurations. Things are length, pitch/height, member sizes can be totally parametric and can cover most of the changes.

[KimSwoboda]

Thanks for the quick reply. Yes, you are correct I would not be creating a
new family for each truss if I used a parametric family, I would just need
to individually go through and change the settings for each one. That is
probably the best way to handle it at this point. I know Revit has an
automated program for truss framing as part of the Timber Framing
Extensions, but it does not seem to work if you have more than one ridge
line. I've been hoping they would improve that feature but I haven't seen
any changes yet. Thanks again for your time.

[martinTstewart_Adsk]

You may also want to also check out this Wood Truss Creator for Revit.

And here’s a list of AU online classes searching on Revit-Roof.  May be some interesting supplemental references there.

[KimSwoboda]

I did try out the Truss Plus program as our Autodesk supplier from the Twin
Cities was a US dealer for the product. I spent quite a bit of time trying
to get the program to run but always received an error message part way
through. The dealer out of the Twin Cities was not of any help support wise
and referred me on to the software support people who were from Lithuania.
Language barriers became an issue so I final decided that wasn't the
direction I wanted to go. The product looked great in their demos but I was
never able to get the program to work in any of the models I tried. Also
when I asked our Twin Cities dealer if they had other structural firms using
the product he said not at the time, so I gave on that avenue. I would
really like to hear what other structural consulting firms are doing, being
a small firm of 6 people I know we're not the first ones dealing with this.
Thanks again for you time.

[teodorb]

Hi @KimSwoboda,

Check out this solution: http://strucsoftsolutions.com/mwf-pro/

http://strucsoftsolutions.com/mwf-pro-wood

Kind regards,