The new Revit 2013 Stair and Railing tools brought with them some tricky changes to the selection process that might catch you out.
Selection filters now have some new subcategories for stair components, stair annotation and railing components. All the new stair subcategories have been prefixed with the word “Stairs:”, which makes them easier to find in a list; new stair tags are likewise prefixed with "Stair". Sadly this logic was not applied to new railing subcategories: Top Rails, Handrails and Supports do not have a Railing prefix in the filter, so they don't show in the list in a sensible order. In fact it can get quite confusing because we now have "Stairs: Supports" and "Supports", which are two entirely different things so you have to remember that the latter is for railings only.
When you look at a typical selection filter list the railing subcategories are jumbled up with the rest - this becomes important when you need to specifically exclude some of the subcategories from your selection (see further on).
The same naming convention is used in the properties dialog box. At least it is consistent, if annoyingly wrong!
Railing Terminations and Extensions
cannot be selected, nor do they list with separate subcategories - they are only accessible through the type properties of Top Rails and Handrails.
Visibility / Selection
Any of these railing or stair components can be Tab-Selected or selected
by dragging across them.
The rules for selection/display of
Railing Supports are mysterious and confusing:
- In section and 3D views they are
visible at all detail levels.
- In plan views they are only
visible in Fine detail level;
- Railing Supports below the cut plane in plan views are visible (fine detail level only), and can be selected by dragging or tab-select;
- Supports above the cut plane are only visible during pre-selection or selection highlight (fine detail level only); they cannot be selected by any method except changing the view range cut-plane or going to another view on the next level up;
- In Medium or Coarse detail level below the cut plane in plan view, they can be selected by dragging, in which case they display a pin only (no graphics);
- In Medium or Coarse detail level below the cut plane plan view, they can be tab-selected (location by guesswork), in which case they do not display a pin but do show a highlight line at their origin (no graphics);
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| Medium or Coarse Detail Level |
 |
| Fine Detail Level- railing supports visible |
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| Hidden supports visible when railing is selected |
It is important to note that railing supports
can be selected even when not visible in plan - but only below the cut plane in medium or coarse level of detail.
 |
| Invisible Supports selected |
Pinned Elements
If you select by dragging across a stair, you may get pins showing up on
the stairs. These are actually for the Top Rails, Handrails or
Supports, which are now separate sub-components (somewhat like curtain
wall components) - this means that you can often get numerous confusing pins showing up on screen. This applies to new style railings on both old or new type
stairs, but not old style railings.
You can also Tab-Select these railing sub-components individually. Again, they display pins, but each behaves slightly differently (and differently to curtain wall sub-elements).
Once you have successfully selected a railing sub-component the displayed pin behaves slightly differently for each category, as described below.
Pinned Element Properties
You can unpin them to
unlock and change some of the instance properties:
- Type selector becomes available for all railing sub-categories when unpinned - so you can change the type (Type Selector grayed out when pinned)
- Unpinned railing supports allow the "Hand Clearance" instance property to be changed
- Type properties can be accessed and modified without unpinning them (any sub-category)
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| Pinned Railing Support |
 |
| Unpinned Railing Support |
Stair Component Properties
Stair components do not have pins, but some of their properties can be changed
without editing the stairs.
- Runs and landings allow height property changes - this will have knock on effects to adjacent components - refer to Modifying Landings
- Stair supports may allow changes to cut properties of free ends
Sub-Category Selection Limitations
Depending on how you select elements (multiple selection by dragging across screen or tab-selecting), you will encounter some inconsistent limitations to what you can do with selected stair components or railing sub-categories:
