Modifying Families - Autodesk Revit Architecture 2015 Essentials - page 173

Deal with Filled regions Blocking Lines in the title Block This is a common sce-
nario when adding filled regions and lines in a title block family.

1. In the Family Editor, the filled region is added first, and the
lines are added second (so the display order appears as expected
with the lines on top).

2. Load the title block into the project, and the filled region now
overstrikes the lines. One workaround is to start a new Revit
generic annotation family and cut and paste the filled regions
into the generic family.

3. Lastly, load the generic annotation family into the title block
family and locate as needed.

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While the display order
may appear incorrect in
the title block family,
it should display (and
print) correctly in the
project.

Know When Objects in a Family Cannot Be Deleted Notice that when you start
a new family using a default template, some of the existing elements cannot
be deleted (such as some reference planes). Why is this? Any geometry that is
included as part of the family template cannot be deleted when a new family is
created.

Create a New Family template By default, you cannot save an existing Revit
family ( .rfa ) as a family template ( .rft ). However, you can copy the file in
Windows Explorer and rename the extension from .rfa to .rft . Revit will con-
sider this a family template afterward.

use a “Super” Masking region By default, masking regions mask model geom-
etry in the project environment, but they do not mask annotation elements such
as text, dimensions, tags, or detail lines. If you want to mask model and anno-
tation elements, create a generic annotation family, and add a masking region
in the family. When loaded into the project, the generic annotation family will
mask both types of objects.

use a Family parameter Lock For parameters in a family (Family Types dialog),
there is a column with an option to lock. If you lock a parameter in the family,
any labeled dimension with that parameter applied will be locked. This means
you will be unable to change the value in-canvas. This also means you won't be
able to dynamically flex the family in-canvas (such as dragging a reference plane
with a labeled dimension attached). This is good to keep in mind if you run into
odd behavior when flexing the family; make sure to first confirm whether the
parameter is locked.