Nested Revit Repeaters - Gare do Oriente pt 5

How to use Revit adaptive components and repeaters to create a model of Santiago Calatrava's roof structure of the Gare do Oriente in Lisbon:
Part 1 - The rig for one structural column
Part 2 - Placing roof panels onto the rig
Part 3 - Creating the structural elements 
Part 4 - Adding struts to the structure

Part 5 - Assemble Structure on Platforms

YouTube Link

Step by Step checklist:

Add Column Base

• Open your column structure adaptive family created in steps 1 - 4
• Set the work plane as the horizontal reference plane of adaptive point 1
• Place a reference polygon centred on the adaptive point, first making it 4 sided
• It will give four temporary dimensions, one for each side, from the centreline references
• Make these into real dimensions
• Select all four dimensions and associate them to a parameter called 'Half base'

 

• Optional:  create a new parameter called Base Width
• Optional:  add a formula to 'Half base' = Base Width /2
• Select the four reference lines of the polygon
• Create form
• Drag its top surface up, and it should enable a temporary dimension for the height
• Turn that into a dimension
• Associate it to a parameter 'Base Height'

• The family is now ready to use in a project model

 

Create an Array of Columns

• Load the family into a project
• Create railway platforms (floors or extrusions of some kind) 

• Create an in-place Mass family
• Draw a rectangle of reference lines, with the two long sides centred on the outside platforms
• The length of the rectangle should be a multiple of the distance between each platform

• Select the four reference lines (rectangle)
• Create a form
• Drag the top surface of the form up or down so that it is flush with the top of the platforms
• Select the top surface of the form

• Click on the 'Divide surface' icon

• Depending on the number of platforms/tracks, and the length of the rectangle, adjust the number of U and V grid divisions to achieve a square pattern of grids, one per platform - remembering that the number matches the grid lines not the divisions

• Change the surface representation of the divided path; make the Nodes visible

 

• Place one of the structural adaptive components onto any one of the nodes

 

• Select the component and click on the Repeater icon

• It should create an array of columns, one on each node

• Select the divided surface and hide its nodes again, so that they will not be visible in the project in any views.  NB. if any divided path nodes are visible in the structure, you need to hide those back in the family and reload them (which can be painfully slow, so its better to do so before creating the repeater) 
• Finish the Mass family
• In the project Browser, select the column family and change its 'Inside Radius' property to match half the spacing between nodes (platforms) - this should ensure that the overall size of the roof matches the divided surface grid size
• Adjust any of its other properties as desired - eg. Base Height
• The individual nested families will most likely be shared families, unless you changed that when creating them - so you should be able to adjust other parameters by selecting the nested families in the project browser - eg. Number of struts. NB. it can be slow to make those property changes depending on your computer, but remember that Revit is doing a lot of calculating for each change, and it is still much quicker than creating such a structure by conventional Revit modeling tools.
• You should now have a basic parametric model of the railway station roof of Santiago Calatrava's Gare do Oriente in Lisbon