TIP: Creating Pipe/Duct Fittings in Revit MEP

One frequently overlooked requirement when creating fitting families (specifically elbows) in Revit MEP is that the vectors from the connectors, if extended back into the family, must intersect at the intersection of the Left/Right and Front/Back reference planes.  Otherwise, strange behavior will be observed when routing elbows with the pipe or duct tools.

 

There is a comprehensive tutorial for building a pipe fitting from scratch available here: http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/item?siteID=123112&id=13376617  The documents available at this link are the Revit MEP 2010 Families Guide.  The UI may be slightly different in current releases, but all the same concepts apply.

Comments

[Chad]

Interesting. Hadn't really though about it, but I guess it makes sense that those connector's vectors need to intersect at the origin. Just another one of those MEP family gotchas that users need to look out for.

I've taught MEP families twice over the past two weeks, and the other gotcha which half the users mess up is making the Primary connector pointing along the X-Axis. I use that Elbow example from the Autodesk 2010 training material in my training, as it's a brilliant exercise which explains a lot.