Exporting Zone Information to IFC from Autodesk Revit

Post updated 06/05/2021

When using the BIM Interoperability Tools Zone Manager it is important to note, this only retains the zone/space set up within the COBie Extension itself and not in the model, so in order to get the zone set up information out to ifc, please note the following workflow.

  1. Setup Zones and add spaces
  2. Export COBie Spreadsheet
  3. Using DiRoots SheetLink, select Room (or Space) Category and select parameters Number, ZoneName, ZoneClassificationCode, ZoneDescription (in that order)

(update) Note: ZoneName, ZoneClassificationCode & ZoneDescription shared parameters (instance parameters (Text/IFC Parameters) assigned to Room/Space categories) can be found in the latest IFC2019 Autodesk App v19.5.0 which when installed are located C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\ApplicationPlugins\IFC 2019.bundle\Contents\2019 in file IFC Shared Parameters-RevitIFCBuiltIn.txt.

  1. Now select Export to …/Export – save excel file e.g. “Room Names.xlsx” – once saved, the file will open
  2. Now we need to update the values to match the “cobie_test.xlsx” COBie export
    1. In cell D3 (ZoneName) put =IFERROR(INDEX([cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$A:$I,MATCH(C3,[cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$E:$E,0),1),””)
    2. In cell E3 (ZoneClassificationCode) put =IFERROR(CONCATENATE(“[]COBie Standard:”,INDEX([cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$A:$I,MATCH(C3,[cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$E:$E,0),4)),””)
    3. In cell F3 (ZoneDesciption) put =IFERROR(INDEX([cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$A:$I,MATCH(C3,[cobie_test.xlsx]Zone!$E:$E,0),9),””)

Note for “cobie_test.xlsx” you may need to put the follow path or open up and select the cells as noted in the actual file.

  1. Once complete, select the above 3 cells and copy/drag down all the relevant spaces.
  2. Now select columns D, E & F, right click Copy, then right click Paste Values.
  3. Now close and save the file, and in DiRoots SheetLink (which should still be open, if not just open the App up again making sure Whole Model is selected), select Import from …/ Import – select the Export file which will now import and override all the Zone data to the relevant Rooms/Spaces.
  4. If you update the Zone information at a later date or add new spaces remember to run through the process to update or manual add to the COBie.Space (Rooms) or COBie.Space (Spaces) schedules.

The following video has been prepared to walk you through the above process.

If you have any suggestions, comments or a better workflow please get in touch.

The above is an extract from our Delivering COBie, Ifc & Classification for Revit course which is now available online – please get in touch for details.

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