Breaking The Manufacturer Content Bias – A Content Journey To Automated Revit Project Properties Management

Synopsis:

“Ewww manufacturer content, I wouldn’t touch that”, has been a prevailing mindset, until now. This presentation will demonstrate an automated workflow implemented at a major design firm to modify content as designers add it to Revit projects from a freely accessible, approved online resource. It will also outline the fundamental benefits and needs of design firms for high-quality manufacturer BIM content libraries, which are easily accessible, and built to a consistent standard enabling this workflow.

Learning Objectives:

1. Demonstrate a tool enabling automated Revit property management from external content sources, including lessons learned during development and alternative attempts with Dynamo.
2. Familiarise attendees with the standards of a well-known global Revit content source based in Australia.
3. Enable attendees to develop their own version of the tool, aligning with their existing standards.

Body:

The prevailing view that because most manufacturer Revit content can’t be trusted, so all should be banned, is a common one among design firms. This heavy-handed approach means that BIM teams are often relied on to create content, or less experienced users are left to create poor quality content, impacting model performance. When you combine this significant time requirement with the increasing expectations for visualisations from clients at all project stages, this strategy is costly, inefficient, and not sustainable in the long term. The low-poly modelling preference of the past is becoming less relevant and increasing the handling of work between project stages.

A common complaint associated with manufacturer content is that it brings too many non-approved properties such as object styles, line styles, line patterns and shared parameters into projects. This in turn causes problems with model and annotation objects not aligning with design firms’ established workflows. This presentation will demonstrate how Grimshaw has developed an automated workflow using an add-in running in the background in Revit projects. This add-in has allowed the firm to approve an online content source for use by their design teams, requiring little to no manual processing. Saving everyone involved in delivering Revit projects a significant amount of time, while keeping projects running smoothly and aligned with internal standards. The need for bespoke content still exists, but the work required by design teams and model managers has reduced significantly. The workflow relies on a detailed mapping table developed by the design firm which continues to improve over time through live model audits by project BIM Coordinators.

Non-compliant project properties are only one complaint commonly attributed to manufacturer content libraries. We can’t automate a poorly built, or overly modelled family into something suitable for use in projects. Therefore, having a trusted source of consistently built content, with a published content standard is integral to this workflow. Glenn Sinclair, from BIMContent.com, will then present their methodology and standards to help others develop their own automated workflow.

Following Glenn’s presentation, Connor will present the design firm’s existing mapping table and demonstrate the process of mapping existing project properties. As well as the tool processing a piece of content from the approved source, and an alternative piece of content not built to a consistent standard.