Revit 2018 – Upside Down Elements with Hosted Families in Revit MEP

By Dennis Collin

Sometimes when placing hosted families in Revit, lighting fixture and plumbing fixture objects will be placed upside down. This is often due to a Reference Plane drawn in an unexpected direction (right to left, rather than left to right) or an undesired face selection in a 3D view.

Fig 1.  A well illuminated ceiling void!

Obviously an incorrectly placed family can have all kinds of undesired results with schedules, space reporting, service routing and energy analysis. However, the problem can be fixed quite easily by cutting a section, selecting the component and flipping the reference plane orientation as shown in the image below.

Fig 2. Left clicking on the node will correct the light fitting orientation

A similar problem can also occur with plumbing fixtures, particularly the hosted sink. However, you will also need to mirror the sink after correction to avoid the hot and cold pipe connectors being the wrong way around!

Fig 3. Sink with the hot water connector on the left, as per the usual convention.