Revit 2013 - Problematic Railing System

by Dennis Collin

A little problem with railing systems was brought to my attention pretty recently that is probably worth a mention. It concerns Revit 2013 (Architecture & BDS) and how certain railing systems don’t always show correctly in section and sometimes 3d views.

Flip the offending section view the other way and this absent rail mysteriously reappears!

All in all this is very strange. It is worth noting that Service Pack 3 does not address this problem, although it does fix numerous other issues. It is also interesting that Revit 2014 does not seem to have this problem. Trying to replicate the problem I was having in Revit 2013(sp3) and all was well the railings showed in all views as you would expect!

The cause it seems is where railing systems lack baluster components and when displayed in a certain way, often in a section view, Revit decides that it shouldn’t show anything! The problem can be cured by creating an empty baluster component and loading into the problem project. Then by editing the railing system family and including this ‘empty’ baluster the railing miraculously reappears! All is well with the 2013 project again!

To read more, donwload the whitepaper....

• Railing_System_White_Paper.pdf400 KB