Inside the System

Building Performance Analysis - Spaces & Zones

The geometry defined by the Bounding Elements in the Revit Physical Model, in conjunction with the Volumes they define, make up a critical piece to accurate BPA.  Without the proper metadata to define the conditions in those Volumes, one must make a lot of assumptions to produce BPA results.  Like I spoke about in my last post, this metadata is the "fuel" that gets fed into our BPA capabilities.

In Revit MEP 2009, we define that information in 3 places:

• Project Information
• HVAC Zone Elements
• Space Elements

We covered the Project Information in my past post, today we're going to cover the fuel that exists on the HVAC Zone and Space Elements.

It's important to note that while this information exists on these elements, that information can be authored:

• In the Heating & Cooling Loads dialog: In this dialog you can multi-select Spaces or Zones, and author the information for all selected elements.
     
   
• On the Elements themselves: In a view you can select individual elements or multi-select elements and then author this data from the Element Properties dialog.
     
   
• In a Schedule: Much of the information can be scheduled in a Zone or Space schedule, and then be authored there.

Just like many other things in Revit, you have access to that same data in many interfaces, and a change in one location updates the core definition of that data.  That means that all locations update immediately.

2009 Improvements
With the release of Revit MEP 2009, we've completed two different categories of improvements to the metadata that exists on HVAC Zone and Space Elements.

• Additional "Overrides" of Space Assumptions - We make a lot of determinations for the environmental conditions based upon the Building Type/Space Type that's defined in the Revit Project.  We have allowed for explicit control over additional environmental conditions in Revit MEP 2009.  This will allow you to override the Building Type/Space Type assumptions if desired.
  
  For example, the Outside Air (AKA fresh air) quantities can now be explicitly defined by the user on the HVAC Zone, rather than be defined by the Builging Type/Space Type assumptions.
• Location of Metadata - The introduction of the HVAC Zone element creates a more logical location for some of our metadata than the Space Element, so we've moved some metadata to these more logical places.

Now let's cover this information in detail in a video.

Building Performance Analysis Data - HVAC Zones & Spaces

Next we're going to put this all to work and discuss using the Heating & Cooling Loads dialog to calculate the peak loads for our Revit projects.

Building Performance Analysis - Project Info

For those of your following along thus far with my overview of the upcoming release, we've covered the major changes to Volumes in Revit MEP, and discussed the new recommended workflows.  I hope all that is clear.

These volumes, in combination with the metadata associated with the volumes and project, constitute the input data required for our Heating and Cooling Load calculations.  Today we're going to take the next logical step, and discuss the metadata that's used as "fuel" for our Building Performance Analysis (BPA) capabilities.

Although I have been focused on "new things" for the past couple of weeks, this discussion is focused on all of the "fuel" that's used for our calcs.  In my cutting of the video, it seemed that this didn't hurt the process.  I hope this all makes sense to you all.

Building Performance Analysis Data - Project Info

Now you all can say "I know the data that's captured at a project-level for BPA calculations."  Tomorrow, I hope you can all say "I know the data that's captured on HVAC Zones and Spaces for BPA calculations."

Zoning it Up

Now that you've all had a day to calm down from the excitement induced by my last post, I thought I'd continue the momentum into the next logical step...creation of Zones.

Those of you familiar with Groups, MEP Systems, or MEP Circuits will feel right at home with the user interaction that's been implemented around Zones.  Spaces are the building blocks and you can either use existing Spaces or add them from within the Zone Editor.  There's my 2 sentence explanation of the workflow.  For a more detailed explanation, go ahead and watch my video below.

Zone Creation

As always, comments/questions/showering of praise is always welcomed.

Let There Be Zones!

So we've spent a lot of time talking about the enhancements to volume Elements (Spaces and Rooms) in Revit 2009.  I hope you all enjoyed it and understand some of the new arrows that have been added to your Revit quiver.  Today we are going to talk about yet another new Revit Element that involves Volumes.

Zones
Individual volumes in Revit are a handy thing, no doubt.  When it comes to doing Heating and Cooling Load calculations, they are vital to understanding the peak loads, and more importantly airflow requirements.   When it comes to determining the loads required for a piece of equipment, individual volumes aren't much help.

Why you ask?  A piece of equipment can serve a Zone of a building that contains individual volumes that have different exterior exposures, or different internal load scheduling.  This means that the individual annual peak loads occur at different times.  Simply adding up the peak loads for the individual volumes just won't do the trick.  Enter the Zone Element.

Zone Justification

Anybody involved with MEP design already knows about Zoning, and the importance of Zoning schemas for carrying out design tasks.  I hope the above video helps to explain the justification for the creation of the Zone Element.  We'll go into detail on the creation of Zones in subsequent videos.

Till then, enjoy some awesome owning of a tv reporter.

Reporter Owned By Sled - Watch more free videos

Great Tool for Local File Management

I'll file this one under "Incredibly Useful Information".  Esteemed Reviteer and burgeoning Obi-Wan-Kenobi Dave Baldacchino has posted an awesome tool for Local File Management on his great blog.  Being the huge dork that I am, I follow many of the Revit forums, and David's knowledge and perspective is always valued.  His blog made the cut on my Outlook RSS Feeds.

As Revit is still new for most MEP firms, the concept of Local Files and Central Files is also new to many.  David's tool is a great way to streamline the creation of Local files for your Revit projects.

How does all this Local File <-> Central File stuff work you say?  Well that is a simple Google search away...or you can just check out this handy article on the subject.

Gettin' Fancy

You're probably all aware of the Upper Limit Parameter on the Room Element from previous releases.  That controls the top extent of the Room Element you've defined.  The actual top extent of the Room is not always the Upper Limit value however, because of the Bounding Element behavior we have spoken about recently.  So, if a Roof is encountered by Revit as it extrudes the Room vertically, then the Room Volume will stop at the Roof.  Makes sense right?

Well, what happens if you need to extrude the bottom extent of the Volume in the same manner?  Until this release, there was no good way to do it.

Based upon our discussion yesterday, we talked about how the overall cross section of the Volume is calculated.  This is all good and logical, but there are certainly situations where your typical approach to defining Volumes breaks down.  Like....let's say for instance an outward sloped wall....*hushed silence falls over the room*...this has always been difficult if not impossible until this release.

"Show me" you say?  Gladly...

Volumes in Complex Geometries

So there you have it, we now have a few more tools in the toolbox to handle complex building forms.  The box may not have every tool necessary, but this is a step in the right direction for our Revit Analytical Models.

Making the Cut

I'd like to maintain my momentum today and continue our discussion on Volumes in Revit MEP 2009.  We've been discussing best practices for their creation, and today we are going to explain an important concept for Volumes, the Calculation Height.

We've spoken previously, and highlighted in the Building Performance Analysis in Revit White Paper how we extrude Room Volumes vertically until we hit the Upper Limit of the Room or we hit a Bounding Element.  Spaces in Revit MEP 2009 have the same behavior.  What defines the Cross-Section of that vertical extrusion?

The answer is the Room's Perimeter, which is defined by the Bounding Elements that make up the Circuit around the Room in a Plan View.  What happens if those bounding elements are slanted in different directions?  Well the Cross Section will change as you move vertically from the floor.

The thing in Revit that defines the height that Cross-Section area is cut is the Calculation Height.  In previous releases there was a global project setting in the Room and Area Settings... dialog that allowed for Automatic calculation or an explicitly defined height.  Those choices still exist in 2009, but now are applied on the Level Type, rather than a global project setting.

What does that all mean to you?  Well if you deal with complex geometries in your Architectural Models in Revit, then it will mean a whole lot.  Let's explain the concept in a video.

Calculation Height on Level Types

I hope that all makes sense to you all.  We'll continue this topic tomorrow and examine how we can leverage this new behavior to handle some complex Architectural forms.

Space Creation - Part 2

You'll notice a theme with many of my posts thus far regarding our upcoming release, the use of video to illustrate the new feature of workflow.  I just don't know a better way to do it for all of you loyal readers, so I'll stick with it (thanks for your great feedback as well, keep the comments coming).  So with that in mind, let's keep on moving towards the promised land of Revit MEP 2009 mastery...

We already began speaking about the new Space Element in a previous post.  I thought I'd continue that discussion today, as it's the core of a lot of other improvements we'll be talking about over the coming weeks and months regarding Volumes in your Revit Models, and how to define them properly.  Once defined, they are the cornerstone of an accurate Analytical Model, which in turn is the cornerstone of accurate Building Performance Analysis.

Today we're going to continue to talk about the new workflows for success in Revit MEP regarding Spaces.  I know I could just give you a list of new features, or even just show them, but illustrating the workflows associated with those features is the best way to introduce you to them.  In short, I don't want to just feed you a delicious new fish, I'd rather teach you how to catch it.

As I've spoken about earlier, I don't spend all day on these videos, as I don't have all day to do so (I've got to actually do my regular job AND try to have a life).  Trying to get a video up to perfect quality without "UMs " and "Ahhs" and minor screwups is pretty time consuming, so I just send them out into the wild.  Keeping that in mind, post any comments for points that need clarity.

Spaces and Ceilings

There you have it.  A little more understanding of how Volumes in Revit interact with other Elements in the model.  I hope you found that informative.

<huge dork>Tomorrow we're going to talk about how we calculate the Cross Sectional Area of Volumes...oh boy! </huge dork>