REVIT PURE

BASICS TEMPLATE
USER GUIDE

VERSION 3.0 - September 2019 - Revit 2017-2018-2019-2020

[Link]
© Copyright 2019 - BIM Pure Productions
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© Copyright 2019 - BIM Pure Productions - [Link] BASICS
The Revit Pure BASICS template is conceived for architects, builders and
designers. We modified the default Revit template to create a beautiful,
lean, simple and efficient document that is used and loved by hundreds of
users. The default font is Swiss721 Cn BT, which is more cute than Arial.

Eventually, you will have to adapt this template to fit your own needs.

You can replace all RP values in the template by the abbreviation for your
office name. Then, modify the title blocks to add your own logo.

The first thing to do in the template is to have a look at the legends views.

The RP-Template Standards view contains all lines, regions, tags and other
families in the template.

The RP-Detail Components contains a few detail items that you can use
in 2D detailing views.

This guide explains how this template is built. Good luck.

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© Copyright 2019 - BIM Pure Productions - [Link] BASICS

DEFAULT BUILDING

When opening the Level 1 floor plan, you will see a default building. It was
created so you can see some of the tags and dimensions used in action. Of
course, you can delete these elements when starting a new project.
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LEVEL 1 HEIGHT

In the template, Level 1 is set to 0mm (0’-0’’) by default.

Would you prefer to have it set to 10 000mm (100’-0’’)? Simply go to

an elevation view. Unclip and unpin the Project Base Point and move it
vertically until Level 1 has the value you want to use.
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STANDARD PREFIX

One of the first thing you will notice when opening the template is that
everything is named with the RP prefix. Why even do that? The reason is
to keep your template clean. Every time there is a foreign element loaded
in your project, it will be obvious since it’s name will be random.

You should replace this RP prefix by your own office standard prefix.
That should take you 1 hour or so, but it will help you get familiar with the
content inside the template.
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FAMILIES ORGANIZATION

The default Revit template family organization is a mess. It’s almost

impossible to tell from a family name what it is actually doing. We fixed this
issue by giving the RP prefix as well as another prefix indicating the family
type. We also try to avoid spaces in family names.

Here is the full list of special prefix with an example for each case:

Annotation Symbols: RP_ANN_Plan-[Link]

Detail Components: RP_DT_Glass.rfa
Doors: RP_DOOR_Simple.rfa
Profiles: RP_PRL_Gutter-[Link]
Railings: RP_RAI_Baluster-[Link]
Site: RP_SITE_Parking-[Link]
Tags: RP_TAGS_Window.rfa
Title Blocks: RP_TB_ArchE.rfa
View Symbols: RP_VIEW_Section-[Link]
Windows: RP_WIN_Fixed.rfa

When you start modifying this template with your own standards, you can
replace the RP prefix by your own office prefix.
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MATERIALS

In addition to default materials, this template includes additional useful and

beautiful materials. As you will notice, all materials contain the prefix RP
which you can rename to fit your office standards. Be careful: every time
you load an external family, all the embedded materials will be added to
this list. Make sure to keep your materials clean.
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VIEWS ORGANIZATION

We created a few additional view types that are used by most users. This
includes Interior Elevation, Wall Section, Wall Section Callouts.

By default, the view names are numbered. This is a great way to keep your
views organized and we recommend you to keep this technique when
creating views.

Each Wall Section Callout has two numbers: one referring to the original
wall section and another one referring to the detail number for that wall
section.
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INDEPENDENT VIEW TEMPLATES

When creating views, make sure to select the correct view type. For
example, when creating elevations, you can pick between Building
Elevations and Interior Elevations. Each has a different view setting
applied and will be categorized separately in the project browser.

In this template, view templates are used for all new views However, the
new views are not dependent on template by default. That means you
can change the view settings without problems. That is the best option
for beginners, but more advanced users might prefer to make views
dependent on template for better uniformity and control.
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SHEETS ORGANIZATION

We created a sheet numbering that fits the most popular scheme we saw
around multiple architecture firms. Of course, feel free to rename them to
fit your office standards.

Most views are already placed into the sheets.

There is additional sheets. X1 - WELCOME PAGE will open every time

you open the project. X2 - ALL TITLE BLOCKS contains all the RP title
blocks available by default.
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TITLE BLOCKS

The template contains 8 custom title blocks. The size are made to
accommodate to people worldwide: Letter, A4, 11x17, A3, ArchD, A1,
ArchE and A0. You will have to modify each title block to place your own
logo instead of the Revit Pure logo.
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WELCOME PAGE

Revit has the option to use a Starting View. This is helpful to get everyone
to see the same thing when they open a project. The Starting View in this
template is the sheet called X2 - WELCOME PAGE. It contains a title
block with all sorts of useful information like project name, project number,
address, contacts, etc. It also contains a “communications” space where
you can type friendly messages to your colleagues.
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PLAN NOTE SYSTEM

The template includes the plan note system described in this blog post:

[Link]
revit

This includes a family called RP_ANN_Plan-[Link].

It also includes 4 default Revit schedules to go along the note family: Floor
Plan notes, Ceiling notes, Elevation notes and All notes. There is a default
note created for each view type and placed on the views. These schedules
are already placed on sheets A100, A200 and A400.
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LINE WEIGHTS
The lineweights in the default Revit template are a little too light.
Also, they use different thickness for different scales, which from our
experience is useless and confusing. We made the Line Weights a little
heavier, which produce drawings with more hierarchy.
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LINESTYLES
The linestyles in the default Revit template are boring. We created a
linestyle for each thickness value instead of the usual, confusing Light Line,
Medium Lines, Heavy Lines you get in the default.

Also, we added lines that are extremely useful for either detailing or to
use as guides when modeling. For example, we like to use RP-1-Red
as a “working line” to establish a 2D layout before modeling actual 3D
elements.
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DIMENSION STYLES

Here are the default dimension styles used in the template.

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TEXT TYPES

Here are the default text types used in the template. The font used for all
text is Swiss721 Cn BT, which is included with Windows.
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REGION TYPES
Most of these regions are based on the default template, but we also
added a few regions that were popular and useful for users.
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TAGS
The default tags families were certainly lacking, so we added many new
tags that were the most used by users. The multi-category tag indicates
the type mark, which can be useful for most model elements.
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DETAIL COMPONENTS

The template includes a few popular, easy to use detail components. You
will find them all in the view RP Detail Components.
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© Copyright 2019 - BIM Pure Productions - [Link] BASICS

INTERNAL ORIGIN

Did you know Revit includes a secret internal origin coordinate? This origin
is invisible. By default, all imported and exported CAD files will be made
relatively to this origin. In the RP template, the location is indicated in
the site view and in the elevation view by reference planes and red text.
It intersects grids A and 1 and the height is set to Level 1. If you are using
Revit 2018 or 2019, these references planes have their own category
called “Internal Origin” that can be turned on or off.

RED TEXT ANNOTATIONS

To help you navigate the template, we added a few red text annotation
guidelines. Once you are comfortable, feel free to delete these texts.
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VIEW SYMBOLS
The view symbols have been revamped to be beautiful and efficient.
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OTHER SYMBOLS
Here are some additional annotations families.
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WHAT’S NEXT?
This template fixes many glitches and annoying features of the default
Revit template. You can use it as is for your first few projects. Eventually,
you will probably have to start customizing and integrating your own
content inside this template. Make sure to always keep your template
lean and efficient. If necessary, keep a separate Revit container file with
additional families, drafting views, wall compositions, etc.

Any questions? Any comments? Please contact me: nick@[Link]

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

My name is Nicolas Catellier. I am an architect,
designer and BIM manager based in Quebec City,
Canada. I’ve been working with Revit since 2011
and I am a Autodesk Revit Architecture Certified
Professional. I am also a technology enthusiast, a bass
player and a father of two. Besides Revit Pure, I also
work for Atelier 21 Architects.