Bishop Posted October 19, 2012 Share Posted October 19, 2012 I work for a very large company which shall remain anonymous. It has locations in every state / province in the US / Canada, and all over Europe and most of South America as well. We make a wide variety of building products. I'm in the engineering group of one division of the company, and we do R&D and product support for the manufacturing plants of that division. We use - in this division - Inventor 2013 (a few locations) or 2011 (most locations, but upgrading soon). The rest of the company - worldwide - is using AutoCAD of one flavor or another. So I was talking with one of the national management guys, and according to him, Revit and BIM are the wave of the future in our company, and I'd best get educated about them so that when the money people come calling I have something more useful to say than "WTF is Revit? I only know how to use Inventor." Anyway. I've read through a bunch of white papers on BIM and such, and from what little I've picked up in the past couple days, these assumptions are what I'm working with at the moment: 1. Revit is great in a construction project environment, but has far more limited application in the actual development of products. Inventor is far more suited to doing digital prototyping, mechanical design, simulations, production drawings & models, etc. 2. Building on #1 above, because my primary mission is supporting manufacturing and the development of new products, Inventor is more suited for the creation of the types of deliverables that I'm responsible for. That said, Autodesk has built in a lot of interoperability between Inventor and programs such as Revit, which will enable me to also deliver things which are of use in the BIM area, where Revit (or similar) would be less likely to cover both fields. 3. Building on both above points, the choice between Revit and Inventor should not be a zero-sum game. Both products are useful in their proper place, but neither one can really replace the other. Essentially what I've been told is that the corporate types - who don't have to actually use this stuff - see Revit and think ooh! Shiny! 3D! Bills of Materials! and as a result they want to kill AutoCAD and Inventor both in favor of the new technology. AutoCAD and Inventor are old tech, don't'cha know? It's been put forward that capital expenditures, training costs and learning curve are of absolutely zero import here, so long as we can claim to be on the bleeding edge of the software curve. So, what I need to know - and I don't have time to take out an MBA focussed on construction management! - is: - Am I thinking correctly in my view of the potential relationship between Inventor and Revit / BIM & general? - Can Revit actually support a manufacturing & mechanical design environment in such a way as to successfully replace Inventor? - What other aspects should I be looking at / thinking about / looking into? Thanks for your time and feedback! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobDraw Posted October 19, 2012 Share Posted October 19, 2012 Your thinking is absolutely correct. The corporate types are going to have to realize that Revit is not a replacement for but the next step in the process from Inventor. Inventor will build the product and Revit uses the product and its information for the building design. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dadgad Posted October 19, 2012 Share Posted October 19, 2012 It sounds to me like you have a pretty good sense of what the deal is here, and almost certainly you have a better understanding than the corporate boys. Could be worse though, as you can take advantage of their alpha dog desire to be cutting edge, and get it all, for not very much money, within the context of a huge multinational company http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/pc/item?siteID=123112&id=20116264 . If they want the bragging rights, just get the ULTIMATE SUITE and you are all good to go, no matter what you want to do. It goes without saying of course, that no matter how great your workstation is now, you will be requiring an upgrade to ensure your continued ability to be at the bleeding edge, and to maximize on the new software system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tzframpton Posted October 19, 2012 Share Posted October 19, 2012 Bishop, you are dead-on accurate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resullins Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Hey... I'm bumping this thread to ask a different type of advice. My company has started getting a lot of jobs from architects that are working in Revit. My boss has decided to go ahead and get a license of Revit so that we can manipulate and make DWG's out of these models. My question is, do we REALLY need a full version? I have been looking at the features comparison on Autodesk.com, but not knowing really what these features are to begin with, I'm not sure whether or not I need them. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobDraw Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 I heard something about a Revit LT... might worth a look at. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resullins Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 That's what I mean. I can't tell the difference between LT and full... cause I don't know what the features are to begin with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tzframpton Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Hey... I'm bumping this thread to ask a different type of advice. My company has started getting a lot of jobs from architects that are working in Revit. My boss has decided to go ahead and get a license of Revit so that we can manipulate and make DWG's out of these models. My question is, do we REALLY need a full version? I have been looking at the features comparison on Autodesk.com, but not knowing really what these features are to begin with, I'm not sure whether or not I need them. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Learning and using Revit would not be a bad thing. It would be a very good thing, and a step in an onward direction for your company. I'm a huge fan of Revit and I like to stay in Revit as opposed to AutoCAD for any building related design work (eg: arch, structural, MEP, etc). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resullins Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Well, most of what we do are 2D schematics... we do some structural... but will LT do everything I need? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tzframpton Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 LT should, yes. If that's all you're doing then Revit wouldn't benefit much, I agree. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomhamlet Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 That's what I mean. I can't tell the difference between LT and full... cause I don't know what the features are to begin with. One of the main differences is that in Revit LT, multiple people can not work on the same drawing at the same time. For smaller companies, thats ok. If you havent used worksharing before, It can be a valuable tool, but it wont be missed. Auto desk actually suggest smaller companies go with the LT version. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resullins Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Ah... yeah, we wouldn't be needing that since we would only be buying one license anyway. That's what I needed to know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomhamlet Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Ah... yeah, we wouldn't be needing that since we would only be buying one license anyway. That's what I needed to know. Good, if you would like to look into it more, here is a comparison http://usa.autodesk.com/revitlt/features/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resullins Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Ok... now which one of you is going to come out to Nashville and teach me how to use it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomhamlet Posted November 14, 2012 Share Posted November 14, 2012 Ok... now which one of you is going to come out to Nashville and teach me how to use it? even though that is right down I-65 from where I am, I would be hard pressed to make the trip. Also, as I have only had a few corses in Revit, I am not sure how helpful I would be Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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