Best Practices for project set up for multi family/townhouse projects

[AndrewBeres]

Hello, our firm is starting to use BIM for larger projects including muti-family and townhouse projects. We have been working in 2d with symbols for unit types to manage the monotony previously, but we are looking to become more efficient with our process and start to take advantage of the 3D & BIM capabilities of VW. 

 

How does your firm handle unit types in BIM? 

 

Can you tag items within a symbol in the annotation layer? We haven't found a way to do this. 

 

Do you model the exterior envelope and then build out all the unit types as symbols separately? 

 

Is anyone willing to share a real life project file for multi-family or townhouses that we can learn from? 

 

Thanks in advance!!

 

 

[vlala]

@AndrewBeres You can find several sample projects at vectorworks university. 
There are download files also attached.

 

 

[Jeff Prince]

Here is one approach as a starting point…

 

The site is one vectorworks file.

Each unique townhouse building is a separate vectorworks file.  Other structures and site amenities can also be separate files, as required.

 

You then reference each townhouse into the site for positioning the buildings, copying and rotating for any duplicate units.

 

Within each townhouse building file, the geometry can be orientated based on your documentation needs rather than real world position.

 

If the guts of a building have repeating features unique to the building, these should be symbols.  If the guts are repeated between multiple different buildings, these should be reference files.

There seems to be some debate over this, so you’ll have to decide for yourself.  When done correctly, this approach can save a lot of effort.

 

Your annotation question… data tags and notes work fine in the annotation space of a viewport.

[shorter]

It all depends on how you structure a file too.

 

the solution in a single file is different to a multiple file approach.

 

What you need to see on the drawing also influences the way you set things up.

 

If you are also prepared to step outside the ‘expected’ approach you will find some processes are actually quicker if you do not let the software or bim dogma dictate process or practice.

 

 

[Jeff Prince]

16 minutes ago, shorter said:

It all depends on how you structure a file too.

 

the solution in a single file is different to a multiple file approach.

 

What you need to see on the drawing also influences the way you set things up.

 

If you are also prepared to step outside the ‘expected’ approach you will find some processes are actually quicker if you do not let the software or bim dogma dictate process or practice.

 

 

You are creating more questions than answers 😉

@AndrewBeres there are a bunch of write ups here in the forum covering various methods of doing what you hope to accomplish.  I’m biased towards my method obviously.  Not only do you have to consider the file management approach, but also Stories vs Design Layers, layer/story bound vs discretely defined features, and a whole host of other complications.

[zoomer]

5 hours ago, jeff prince said:

You are creating more questions than answers 😉

 

I agree ...

In my personal opinion ....

Since my VW 2024 career I was always exploring VW workflows on my current knowledge.

Most of them were quite wrong. So I build up some experience and better knowledge over

time until now.

And now I feel even more limited by all that experience when I try set up a new project.

It takes more and more time to include all these, OK, VW can not do this, does not like this, ...

until I seem to have an idea what is the least common nominator for a setup.

 

Currently it seems to work out better than expected, but far from effective and still needing

to tolerate quite some room for VW limitations or failures.

8for thinks that I basically did already 13 years ago in a 2010 Archicad Trial. Or a few weeks

ago in Bricscad flawlessly, at least BIM and geometry wise.

 

VW has a great 2D design capability and a perfect Exchange with Cinema for Rendering,

you could prepare most of your Visualization work already in VW.

But now, also more looking in generated 2D Plans, I also wonder how much time and efforts

it needs to force VW to adapt to your 2D standards in general.

And VW 2023 SP3 in special, where I find so much inconsistencies in setting up Section Line

instances, Viewports, ....  or updating them.

(need to activate/deactivating things like show 2D Hatches, that were not activate but

showed them, in order to get them off and such things)

 

For me the "referencing in a DTM Model File" - or not, is still not ultimately solved to feel

comfortable. Missing things like multiple IFC Building per VW File and so multiple Story

Setups .... will force you to do so.

 

[AndrewBeres]

On 3/4/2023 at 8:47 AM, jeff prince said:

 

Each unique townhouse building is a separate vectorworks file.

 Would you do this as separate files for each TH type? or each building?

 

We often have multiple buildings on a site, and then multiple unit types within each building and spread across the site in various combinations. 

 

In this approach, how would you handle roofs which cross over multiple TH unit types? 

[Jeff Prince]

2 hours ago, AndrewBeres said:

On 3/4/2023 at 6:47 AM, jeff prince said:

 

 Would you do this as separate files for each TH type? or each building?

If a building is unique in its structure or form, it deserves a separate file.

 

 

2 hours ago, AndrewBeres said:

 

In this approach, how would you handle roofs which cross over multiple TH unit types? 

 

I treat building like this as “core and shell”.  The shell can hold various unit layouts.  Each unique unit layouts gets its own file which can be referenced into different shells.

 

There is obviously a law if diminishing returns here when every building is so unique that it can’t be defined with this “kit of parts” approach.  However, it seems to work very well for the vast majority of multi family or office park projects.  Hillsides can be further optimized by keeping the foundation separate from the building file since they vary depending on the situation.
 

[shorter]

On 3/4/2023 at 4:11 PM, jeff prince said:

You are creating more questions than answers 😉

@AndrewBeres there are a bunch of write ups here in the forum covering various methods of doing what you hope to accomplish.  I’m biased towards my method obviously.  Not only do you have to consider the file management approach, but also Stories vs Design Layers, layer/story bound vs discretely defined features, and a whole host of other complications.

Touché!