In my line of work I have clients asking me the question. “How can I control the line weights of an architects model that has been linked into my Revit MEP as a background.
So what has happened is when using Revit MEP, the workflow is to link in the Architects Revit model into your project. When you create views under any other MEP discipline the Architects model (background) is automatically grayed out and the line weights are control by the software. This is a hard coded feature inside of Revit MEP 2009 and previous releases.
Some clients felt that the view was way to light and had troubles viewing the background when the view was printed. In Revit MEP 2009 and previous releases you had to change your MEP views to a different discipline either to Coordination or Architectural and then control the linked model components individually using object styles. This can be a pain especially when you are trying to use the software to its fullest and utilize MEP disciplines to clean up the project browser.
In Revit MEP 2010 the display of the background is still the same hardcoded however Autodesk has created a new setting under Manage > Settings called Halftone / Underlay that will allow you to modify the linked background line weights within a few clicks of the mouse. See screenshots below.
Image 1: As you can see the image to the right shows that I have my 1 – Mech view under Mechanical discipline and HVAC Sub-Discipline.
Image 2: Shows the Architectural background as Revit MEPs default hard coded line weights.
Image 3: In Revit MEP 2010 with your view open that you wish to make the underlay change to click on Manage then click on Settings and activate the Halftone / Underlay tool.
Image 4: With the Halftone / Underlay box open you are able to control the underlay line weight by clicking on the No Override fly out and changing the Weight to a different line weight. Make sure you uncheck Apply Halftone box for this override to work.
Image 5: Or you can click on the reset button and control the halftone of the underlay as indicated in this photos.
This has been a long post, but I hope that the post has helped many of you with your underlay line weight issues. Again assuming you have upgraded to Revit MEP 2010.
