Identifying node which created element / Dynamo generates unexpected elements

Revit
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1

I’m working on a graph which generates dimensions and overrides the values to provide reinforcement tagging information for ranges of bars in a project-specific format. The graph also generates some detail lines which act as leaders to make the drawing clearer.

It is working well, but I started having an issue with Dynamo generating extra dimension and detail line elements in Revit, which are not being output by the nodes. I have queried the extra elements using the Select Model Element node, but I cannot find these elements in any of the output lists in my Dynamo script.

Is there any way to select an element in Revit, which was generated by Dynamo, and identify the specific node which created that element? The graph only contains one copy of each node which is creating the dimensions and model lines, and those nodes are not reporting the extra elements in their output lists. So I want to query the unexpected elements to track down the node which created them (I’m confident there are no such nodes in my script and Dynamo is just randomly generating these elements, which makes no sense). The screen shot below shows the unexpected elements:

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It is particularly odd that the elements line up properly with reinforcement elements which are not at the ends of the ranges I’m trying to tag. I made sure that those reinforcement elements are not included in the lists which define the coordinates of the model lines/dimensions being created. All the output lists show 6 model elements and 3 dimensions, but Dynamo is creating an extra one of each. Below a screenshot of the element ID of the unexpected dot/circle next to the (only) node which creates the circles, showing that the node is not creating that circle. Also note that only 6 points and 6 circles (based on locations of reinforcement elements) are being created, but 7 model curves appear in Revit:

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The same thing applies to the vertical model line and the additional dimension. Below a screenshot of the dimension creation and value override nodes - all lists contain only 3 items, but 4 dimensions are being generated (Select Model Element shows the extra dimension):

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I don’t define the extra elements anywhere in my graph. Is there any way to select them in Revit and identify their source in Dynamo? Has anyone had Dynamo creating unexpected and unreported elements?

The Dynamo file is linked to a large Excel sheet and contains a number of custom nodes, so it will be difficult to clean up and share the files here. I hope it is possible to find an answer/solution without the files.

Thanks for your time

2

I will probably not be of much help on this but what it inspires me at first sight is that there could be some superimposed lines/elements in your model. Did you check that?

3

Hi, thanks for your reply.

I had another look at my script and I found the offending node. I noticed that it is only the detail lines I created using the DetailLine.FromCurve node from the Clockwork package that was generating extra elements, without reporting them in the node output. The detail lines I made using the built-in DetailCurve.ByCurve were not generating extras.

The Clockwork node was feeding into my dimension generation node, so this caused an extra dimension to be generated as well (also not reported in the node output). I replaced all the Clockwork nodes with built-in nodes and I no longer have extra elements being generated.

Now I have a different problem. The built-in DetailCurve.ByCurve node does not seem to be able to make a closed circle, which is why I used the Clockwork node. This is what the circles look like generated by the built-in node:

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Is there another node I can use to make closed circle detail lines? Is it normal for the built-in node not to be able to create the closed circle?

Thanks

4

Closed circles are sometimes difficult for Revit (hence why some sketches will automatically split themselves into two circles). Try creating two arcs - one for 0-180 degrees and one for 180-360 degrees - and see if that fixes the problem.

5

Hi Jacob,

Thanks for your reply, it works and I’ll use it as a workaround.

Cheers

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