Thinking of cheating on my AutoCAD with that hot new Revit program.

[fostertom]

Very gd advice so far - thanks - keep it coming

[Brands]

Lee and Jack, thanks for the comments.
Your advice really gives me a good view of your experience.
Jack, you describe this process as being the change from the drawing board to CAD, a change that was in my eyes a great one, making production faster and easier to edit.
...So if this is the future of the drafting business it mean the change will come sooner or later, so there would be no point in pushing judgment day forward...Your company will either make it, or die in the process...
(me thinking)
Work is kind of slow now, so there would be time and room for learning something new. We don't have companies for clients, at least not in a way that they need to work in our drawings. So we're not bound by another companies' software.
We are the first and last stage of the drawing process: we design, present, we get the building permits, we create the building drawings. (the package Autodesk is presenting as the circle to fit the Revit suite)
My college did a Revit minor about a year ago, so he has an advantage when we would take training, thus making my transition easier.
And if this is the future of the drafting business it mean the change will come sooner or later, so there would be no point in pushing judgment day forward...Your company will either make it, or die in the process...

I'm going to moil this over and make a list of pro's vs con's for the companies switch.
Thanks for the help!

[fostertom]

The intricate details of which you speak might best be done with Inventor

That is interesting.

I had a Mech Eng client who designed his hi-tech extension to Georgian terrace house, using Inventor (was instructive to see the lateral thinking and product sources he employed - he just called me in to solve Building Regulations issues etc). I saw the screen display, which seemed really hard to read, too much overlapping detail, and paper prints that somehow couldn't be made legible with lineweights etc.

I wonder if a Mech Eng solid modeller really can handle buildings. I had a play with Alibre, which showed me that in Mech Eng you're assembling pre-formed components, whereas in building you're all the time installing cuboid objects and boolean trimming them against one another in situ. Alibre wasn't set up to do that at all. What's Inventor like then?

[Dadgad]

Here is a vertical building suite (premium) which can be downloaded for a free 30 day trial, including most of Autodesk's best stuff. It does not include Inventor, nor Navisworks, both of which are also available for 30 day free trials . While this would certainly give one a pretty good taste of a lot of different options, it would mean that you would have less time with each one, than if you took free trial versions of them individually in succession.

Let's not forget that students can download free software too.

[Lee Roy]

Have you tried AutoCAD's 3D capabilities? You're already proficient in AutoCAD, so try the 3D there in an environment you're already comfortable with.

Revit is NOT like AutoCAD. If you got discouraged with SketchUp (easy peasy), you'll likely get the same from Revit. It's an entirely different piece of software and method of drawing. If you can understand that, then go for the 30-day trial and see what you think.

[fostertom]

Thanks Lee Roy. I will do that. Any idea which Acad version was it that got proper 3D incl boolean and I think I heard Sketchup-like push-pull facilities? Turbocad Pro has all that but is another learning curve.

[Jack_O'neill]

Have you tried AutoCAD's 3D capabilities? You're already proficient in AutoCAD, so try the 3D there in an environment you're already comfortable with.

Revit is NOT like AutoCAD. If you got discouraged with SketchUp (easy peasy), you'll likely get the same from Revit. It's an entirely different piece of software and method of drawing. If you can understand that, then go for the 30-day trial and see what you think.

Absolutely...In fact, I've told others that the more experience you have in Autocad, , the harder it will be to learn Revit, or was for me. I kept expecting things to work a certain way, and they don't. Put everything you know about AutoCAD out of your head when you start on revit. It's a brave new world. In reality...I found Revit easier to get used to than Sketchup...thats one bit of software I don't think I will ever use. Nothing worked there like I thought it ought to!

[Dadgad]

Thanks Lee Roy. I will do that. Any idea which Acad version was it that got proper 3D incl boolean and I think I heard Sketchup-like push-pull facilities? Turbocad Pro has all that but is another learning curve.

Autocad 2012 Vanilla has push-pull modeling.

[StykFacE]

Modeling in Revit is completely different too. In Revit you model things with a purpose. In AutoCAD you model things freely. With AutoCAD you don't have to plan much on most things. You just go with it and you can always do things in a random order. With Revit, since it is parametric you really have to understand where you need to end up before you ever start.