Creating an attached detail group in Revit allows you to efficiently manage and synchronize both 3D model elements and their associated 2D detail components within your project. This powerful feature enhances consistency, streamlines documentation, and improves coordination across your design.
What is an Attached Detail Group?
An attached detail group in Revit is a specialized type of group that links 2D detailing elements (such as text, dimensions, detail lines, filled regions, and symbols) directly to a 3D model group. When you move or copy the model group, its attached detail group automatically moves and copies with it, ensuring that your annotations and details always remain correctly aligned with the model geometry.
This synchronization is crucial for maintaining accuracy and consistency, especially in projects with repeating elements like apartment units, office layouts, or structural assemblies.
Why Use Attached Detail Groups?
Integrating attached detail groups into your Revit workflow offers several key advantages:
- Enhanced Consistency: Ensures that all instances of a grouped element have identical detailing, reducing errors and rework.
- Increased Efficiency: Create complex details once and reuse them across multiple instances, saving significant time in documentation.
- Improved Coordination: Maintains the relationship between 3D model elements and their 2D annotations, making it easier to manage changes.
- Streamlined Project Management: Simplifies the process of updating design iterations, as changes to the group propagate to all instances.
Step-by-Step: Creating an Attached Detail Group in Revit
To generate an attached detail group, you must initiate the process by selecting both your model and detail elements together. Follow these steps:
1. Select Elements for Grouping
Begin by navigating to the drawing area in your Revit project. Carefully select both the 3D model elements (e.g., walls, furniture, equipment, structural components) and their corresponding 2D detail elements (e.g., detail lines, text, dimensions, filled regions, generic annotations) that you wish to combine into a group. Ensure all relevant components are highlighted.
2. Initiate the Group Creation Command
Once your selection is complete, you can typically find the "Create Group" command in the Revit Ribbon. This often appears under the Modify | Multi-Select tab or Modify | <Category> tab. Alternatively, you might right-click on the selected elements and choose "Create Group."
3. Name Your Model and Attached Detail Groups
Upon initiating the command, the Create Model Group and Attached Detail Group dialog box will appear. This dialog is where you define the names for both components of your new group:
- Model Group Name: Enter a clear and descriptive name for the primary 3D model group. This name helps you identify the collection of model elements.
- Attached Detail Group Name: Provide a distinct and relevant name for the attached detail group. This name will represent the 2D detailing elements that are linked to the model group.
4. Confirm Group Creation
After entering the appropriate names for both the model group and its attached detail group, click OK. Revit will then create the new model group with its associated attached detail group, which will now function as a unified entity.
Example Scenario: Detailing a Pre-fabricated Bathroom Unit
Imagine you're designing a hotel with multiple identical bathroom units. Each unit consists of various model elements (walls, fixtures, doors) and requires specific 2D detailing (dimensions, material tags, installation notes, floor finish boundaries).
- Select: In a detailed view, select all the walls, fixtures, and doors that form one bathroom unit. Simultaneously select all the 2D detail lines, text notes, and dimensions specific to that unit.
- Group: Use the "Create Group" command.
- Name: In the dialog, name the model group "Bathroom_TypeA_Model" and the attached detail group "Bathroom_TypeA_Details."
- Confirm: Click OK.
Now, when you copy "Bathroom_TypeA_Model" to another location in your hotel plan, "Bathroom_TypeA_Details" will automatically copy and position itself correctly with the new unit, saving you from re-detailing each bathroom individually.
Best Practices and Tips
- Be Specific with Naming: Use clear and consistent naming conventions for your groups to easily identify and manage them later.
- Edit in Context: To modify elements within an attached detail group, you must edit the group. Double-click the group instance, or select it and click "Edit Group" in the Ribbon. Changes made in one instance will update all instances of that group.
- Ungroup with Caution: Ungrouping a model group will separate its elements and discard the attached detail group association, requiring you to re-detail if needed.
- Consider Group Nesting: For very complex assemblies, you might consider nesting groups within other groups, though this should be managed carefully to avoid excessive complexity.
- Leverage Revit Families: For elements that are often repeated and have consistent internal detailing (e.g., a custom window with specific trim details), consider creating a Revit family instead of an attached detail group, as families offer more robust parameter control.
By effectively utilizing attached detail groups, you can significantly enhance your Revit project's efficiency, accuracy, and overall quality.
For more in-depth information on managing groups in Revit, refer to the official Autodesk documentation:
