Revit Family Import

Loren Cook Fan Company provides Revit Families of all of their fans use with Revit MEP 2009. I have a couple of questions regarding this.

1. How can I open these files Microstation or a Bentley Building Product?

2. If I can't open these files now, will I be able to in the future? Is this in Bentley's Plans?

3. My final question is for discussion. What is the best course of action for the community/Bentley to take? I know I keep harping on this issue, but the availability of Revit families from manufacturer's continues to increase and the availability of PAZ/BXC/CEL/DGN files continues to stay the same (from what I am seeing). I believe manufacturer data is incredibly important in the future of BIM/VDC. Are we as Bentley users responsible to continue to push our manufacturers into generating Bentley files? Is Bentley responsible to make conversions between Bentley and Revit "Just Work"? Is there a combination or middle ground?

There will come a time when using BIM tools as an "easier" way to extract 2D drawings will no longer be acceptable. There will be an expectation from Owners/Architects/Engineers/Facility Managers/General Contractors/Subcontractors to see the Rooftop Unit from the Manufacturer in their building. I hope we aren't headed towards a dead end...

Parents
  • Why not use the Bentley Revit Plugin. Load it ontoa machine with Revit on it and you can then export from Revit straight into a 3d.dgn file.

    In answer to Jordan..

    1. As I understand it you have to export from Revit to dwg or dgn.

    2. Open in Revit and export to dwg or dgn.

    3. hmmm.. See other posts regarding discussions already.. the post titled The Wall? is a good one to read.
    Short of testing Revit  - we will all just have to wait and see.

  • The big question is:

    Why are Autodesk´s Products in the eyes of almost any supplier so hot, that they are worth to provide content (DWG, VIZ, Revit) while Bentley´s products aren´t worth a thought ... ?

    Revit is a good example, because Revit´s history with Autodesk is evidently much shorter than the history of Bentley Products such as MicroStation. Nevertheless there are tons of content out there levering the productivity of any Revit user for free, while we have to build our own libraries from scratch. Bentley, how long do you think, we can afford this?

    IMHO there is something wrong with Bentley´s marketing and with Bentley´s commitment for their SMB customers.

Reply
  • The big question is:

    Why are Autodesk´s Products in the eyes of almost any supplier so hot, that they are worth to provide content (DWG, VIZ, Revit) while Bentley´s products aren´t worth a thought ... ?

    Revit is a good example, because Revit´s history with Autodesk is evidently much shorter than the history of Bentley Products such as MicroStation. Nevertheless there are tons of content out there levering the productivity of any Revit user for free, while we have to build our own libraries from scratch. Bentley, how long do you think, we can afford this?

    IMHO there is something wrong with Bentley´s marketing and with Bentley´s commitment for their SMB customers.

Children
  • I can't give you any answer on that one either.

    But as I've said quite often before - the CAD world does not exist of just Autodesk and Bentley. What about Archicad, Nemetschek and Tekla for example? Or Google?

    If those providers don't deliver things that architects can use in Archicad, they are going to lose quite a lot of customers in my opinion (most of the architects here are using Archicad).

  • Andreas,

    of course it is true what you say.

    However, in the end it always comes down to market shares, because this is the base for the decision to support a certain product.

    If you have a look at  the Bentley Annual report and other sources you can see that the market share (worldwide) of the companies you mentioned is relatively small, so it is easy to understand why suppliers provide support for Autodesks applications and not for ArchiCAD for example.

    But not supporting Bentley being at least number two in the market, getting closer to Autodesk every year, is another thing.

    May be that MicroStations great abilities to reference and import lots of file formats and especially DWG is one reason holding them back.

    But everyone of us knows, that we have to pay for the fact that is DWG and not DGN. This is the point why IMO Bentley has to engage to support us, as Autodesk supports their users. They have strategic partnerships with some major players in other markets wich for their customers provide content libraries, plug-ins and even full-fledged applications. This is the point where Bentley does nothing and should act immediately.

    Regards

    Gunnar

  • There are more cad people and draftsmen familiar with Autocad therefore the upgrade to revit is simple.  It goes back to the day when every firm had priated copies of Autocad and everybody had a pirated copy at home.

    Ustn since 1988
    SS4 - i7-3.45Ghz-16 Gb-250/1Tb/1Tb-Win8.1-64b

    Eric D. Milberger
    Architect + Master Planner + BIM

    Senior  Master Planner NASA - Marshall Space Flight Center

    The Milberger Architectural Group, llc

  • Pardon me, I really don't know so very much about Revit.

    But my impression is that Revit is a completely new product series which has nothing to do with Autocad. An upgrade is not trivial and will require that you start from scratch. Financially you may get some pro's as you will can continue with the same software provider.

  • emilberger:
    There are more cad people and draftsmen familiar with Autocad therefore the upgrade to revit is simple.

    Eric: can you qualify "upgrade is simple?".  If you are meaning because ACAD and Revit are made by the same company and therefore there are easier economic means to trade in or link ACAD software to Revit Suites, I agree....that's the ADESK machine.

    If you are talking about moving your workflow from any 2D based workflow to a BIM-based workflow, and assuming because you know the company's 2D platform, so therefore you can glide into an intelligent 3D/BIM Platform, I will disagree.

    Thanks,

    Shawn

    ------------