In this blog we investigate the creation of a custom panel for the curtain wall discussed in the earlier blog:

Holey Façade – Curtain Panel Wall

It should look something like the one shown below.

Use the Curtain Wall Panel Family Template to create the required panel from.

The two outer vertical reference planes are placed equidistant from the center reference plane. The total distance between them is made equal to the required width. While this is not strictly necessary, it does preclude geometry generation errors on flexing the family as the panel is meant to be of a specific size in any case. Once the panel becomes too narrow, the holes interfere with each other and the solid Boolean operations cause the panel generation to fail. The x-ordinate of the hole matrix is then indicated by equally spaced reference planes. In this case, there are 11 interior reference planes (including the center Left/Right Reference Plane).

Next, we need to assign the same kind of arrangement for the horizontal reference planes.

We then slave the dimensions to parameters that are created to arrange the holes such that there is no variation I the pattern between panels.

Now the holes are created in the extruded rectangle. Each hole is placed at an intersection of the reference planes. Each hole also has an individual instance parameter mapped onto its radius, such that a user may enlarge a hole at their discretion.

Here the parameters are shown mapped.

As the panels are created parametrically, they will resize if required to fit sizes that are not exactly as modeled, giving one leeway for artistic license.

If you need help adopting Revit in your office or creating curtain wall panels, please contact us at Micrographics so we may be of further assistance with the above.