Revit MEP - Ensuring correct behaviour of fitting components

By Dennis Collin

When assigning fittings to system families within Revit, the user defined components sometimes do not show on the fittings list under the system families routing preferences dialogue.

Setting categories and sub categories, constraints and parameters are a key part of any family creation, but MEP components also need a part type to be set so that Revit can specifically identify what this component is, how it relates and behaves with respect to the system that it connects to, and whether it is a Tee, elbow or transition part etc.

If this is not correctly set in the Revit family editor, bespoke components will not display as potential elbow components even if the category is correct!

To ensure that an elbow or other fitting knows its correct relationship within a system family, the correct part type needs to be specified when creating or modifying a family. This option is under the family category and parameters function within the ‘create’ tab in the family editor.

Note in the example in the image above. In addition to choosing a pipe fitting category we must also specify the part type as well, to ensure that Revit will ‘see’ it when customising pipe and duct system families. Once saved and loaded into your project template, the customised part will now show in the component lists!

Fig 2. The bespoke elbow fitting now selectable as an option for a typical pipe system!