How to Add Custom Room Tags in Revit?

MeyerFire University | TL203.03

​By Joe Meyer, PE

RESOURCES:

• Notes Page

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TRANSCRIPT

How to add room names to a Revit model? Now there's two ways to do this.  

One is that if you have an architectural model linked in the background, then it's really pretty simple. 

You would go to room tags, which for me is RT.

Or I think if you go to it would be one of these buttons up here. 

Ah, probably.

Nope, it's on the architecture tab tag room.  

Again, I don't use any of the buttons. 

I wouldn't recommend using the buttons. 

Learn your shortcuts and that's going to be the fastest way long term.

So if you have a Revit model as your background, you would go to room tags and it should pick up the spaces, the room, the actual rooms that are in the architectural model recognize those and give you options.

Here I've got a CAD background and I'm working in Revit still again, because that's my preference and so I've created a Generic Annotation that I call a room and hazard tag so for me I go SB which is for symbol and then I grab the right tag and I can go and place it here.

Now there's a few different, there's a few different parameters here that go into this tag, and what I like to do is reference the floor plan for wherever I'm working, so this is Men's Toilet Room 104.

So I’ll go - Men's Toilet, the room number is 104.

The hazard, which is what I'm putting some intelligence into, is a Light Hazard.

I just notate that as LH when I'm doing shop drawings.

This helps differentiate and guide a plan reviewer and an installer as to what the hazard I've designated for that room is. 

Reflected ceiling plan - that is a 9-0 and it's an acoustic ceiling tile, so ACT 9 and if I've got any special notes here, obstructed or unstructured construction I can put it in there.  

But this is this is good, so you would think OK, well that's a lot of work, and especially if I've got to do that for every single space. The reality is every other one after that goes a lot quicker. I hit CC, have multiple selected so I can then take this and pop it to the next one.

What do we got here? We've got toilet room vestibule 103. Our ceiling height. We've got a bulkhead here, but it looks like the ceiling height is going to be the same.  

Uh, is that true? 

Let's check that.

Height is indicated.

Do we have any kind of legend here that gives us a ceiling height unless noted otherwise?

Or maybe there it is detail 3 on A103 right here detail three ceiling height is 9-0 at this bulkhead.

So we know that's 9-0 ACT this is 103.

I'm just going to call this Vestibule.

I usually I match architectural, but that's a long name and unnecessary.

This is like I said, a generic annotation tag.

This is a custom family I've created with each of these parameters. 

That's a really nice thing to create that matches your company standard and provides exactly the information that you want to provide.

I also have what I call a Soffit Tag.

I'm going to change this one here and it's really only providing a couple things.

So SB for that.

And then this is a GYP at the bottom and all I'm doing here with the soffit tag is saying, hey, this header is at a different height.

It's at a lower height.

And I can call that out.

That helps with if I've got structure or if I want to call a deck height.

Something like that. Oh, also for the leader.

I've got it QD as remove leader and AD as add leader.

If you want to adjust that, let's see, I believe it's right up here.

You can add and remove your leader after selecting your Generic Annotation.

And again, I've got all these settings, built and the families built so that matches OK.

I like to always come off of things at a right angle if I can.

So here, so just help keep it clean and then going back I'm going to repeat this process for the rest of the project, so Women’s 105 at 9-feet.

CC copy.

Women's 105 also at 9-feet it looks like I didn't copy that to the right spot, so I'm going to align these so so they're in the right spot.

And I just repeat this process throughout the rest of the project.

I'm always going back and referencing the reflected ceiling plan.

Not all Revit models, even when you have Revit models, have the ceilings modeled accurately, so it is important to publish the or to look at the actual published documents and see what ceiling heights those are called out at.

Kitchen 106 ACT 10-ft.  

I'm going to copy this down here. 106.

10-foot and instead of light hazard in this case, kitchen, OH1 and again just repeat that process if I've got open structure, I'll notate this differently.

Got a few settings on my end, but I like to copy all these around at this stage in the project.

This is a really good way to get familiar with what the layout is.

What the ceiling heights are and really get an understanding for your project.

It's a little bit tedious copying around a floor plan or sorry room tags and doing a custom. 

However, there is a benefit to having full control over that.

If you want to do your hazard classifications like I'm doing here for each space and really make nice notes on Obstructed or Unobstructed Construction and how you're determining that design using this method gives you more control.

Also, if changes are made to the background or different things, sometimes those room tags will automatically update and you'll miss ceiling height changes that happen that could be hard to detect.

This is a nice way to say no, this is when we got the information and the latest information is telling us this is the ceiling height.

This is what we're planning for.  

So I do like having some control over here, even though it does take a little bit longer to populate.

All of this. Also with room tags, you can have a leader and drag it outside the space.

This is, you know I'm able to do soffit tags and room tags and really have complete control if I want to add a leader, move this completely out of the way.  

Revit’s not going to give me a lot of trouble about that, I can.

I can do that.

However I want to do that and you know, really control the look of my drawings, which for me is something that's very nice, so I'm going to repeat this process throughout the whole, and that's in summary, how I go about doing ceiling tags and room tags for a space.  

I'm Joe Meyer, this is MeyerFire University. 

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