topic Re: Component Name in IFC in Collaboration with other software

Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Mon, 04 May 2020 18:26:50 GMT

Hi,

I'm trying to export an IFC file to a cost-estimation software.
I'd like to keep elements geometry, to ease filtering elements by ARCHICAD Properties, but when I do this way Component quantities are listed like "Component1.Projected Area...", "Component1. Volume...", "Component2.Projected Area..." and so on.

Is there a way to see the material name?
Something like "Concrete.Projected Area.." instead of "Component1.Projected Area.."

Many thanks for you help!

Re: Component Name in IFC

Laszlo Nagy — Mon, 04 May 2020 22:17:11 GMT

Could you show us a screenshot of an element in ARCHICAD, then the resulting data in an IFC Viewer? It would be easier to understand the exact situation.

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Tue, 05 May 2020 09:07:09 GMT

yes, many thanks!

Re: Component Name in IFC

Laszlo Nagy — Tue, 05 May 2020 17:32:16 GMT

Which ARCHICAD version is this?
Could you also show me screenshot of two Dialogs within the IFC Translator Dialog?
1. Geometry Conversion for IFC Export settings.
2. Data Conversion for IFC Export settings.

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Wed, 06 May 2020 09:27:53 GMT

Sure:
I'm using AC23.

If I save in IFC 4 I always find components informations organized this way (both if if I explode elements into components or not, because every element looks always the same way).

Re: Component Name in IFC

Laszlo Nagy — Sun, 10 May 2020 19:05:34 GMT

OK, I think I know a solution:

In the "Geometry Conversion for IFC Export" Dialog, change the "Material Preservation Mode" field to the "Explode all elements into parts, preserve materials" option. Then in the IFC Viewer. you should see a Relations Tab (at least in Solibri Model Viewer), and there you can see the Decomposes group, which lists the Components of the Composite. Then you can click any of the Skins and then the Component Properties and Component Quantities will return the proper values.

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Sun, 10 May 2020 21:05:43 GMT

Hallo Lazlo!

Many many thanks for testing and answering me!

Unfortunately I had to use another IFC viewer, because Solibri Anywhere "freeze" every time I try to open any IFC 4 file.

I tried to do what you wrote, but it seems like it works just if you are using IFC 2x3, while if I use IFC 4 skins are not separated even if I activate "Explode all elements into parts, preserve materials"...

Is it right?

Many thanks anyway for your help!

Re: Component Name in IFC

Laszlo Nagy — Mon, 11 May 2020 12:46:41 GMT

If you look closely in the Dialog, in that field it says in parentheses that these options apply only to IFC 2x3. So this is why it has no effect when saving as IFC4.
Try the options below that (Split Complex Elements into Parts) when exporting as IFC4.

By the way, I have experienced the same as you: when I saved it as IFC4, Solibri always said that it cannot open the file. I will report this to GS, although I am not sure if it is an ARCHICAD bug or a Solibri bug. The fact that you could open it in another IFC Viewer would suggest that this might be a Solibri bug or issue with their IFC4 support.

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Wed, 13 May 2020 10:18:51 GMT

Ok, Many thanks again Laszlo!

I hoped there was an alternative solution, because it seems to be quite strange that one of the most important new features is that AC23 fully supports IFC4 but no one thought about how to use it for QTO.

I really hope that they will find a more readable way to name Component's parameters in IFC without the need to explode components:

When you are doing a cost estimation and you export an IFC file exploding parts into components, all the properties you created in ARCHICAD are just applied to the element itself, not to the component, so you can't use them unfortunately.

Re: Component Name in IFC

Laszlo Nagy — Wed, 13 May 2020 12:18:09 GMT

I will forward your findings and comments to GRAPHISOFT, and hopefully, they will implement these changes to the IFC Export in the future.

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Wed, 13 May 2020 13:32:34 GMT

Great!

Many many thanks again Laszlo!

Re: Component Name in IFC

Minh Nguyen — Mon, 15 Jun 2020 07:12:48 GMT

Hi,

Thank you very much for your question! This was a very complex topic, it took us quite some time to get to the bottom of this.

For IFC4, we've implemented a solution that connects Building Material information with the different Components of the element. This solution has even become an IFC4 standard so that all IFC4 models should work like this. However, Solibri can't handle material information with their IFC4 import, and in general, we can say that Solibri's IFC4 compatibility is not very stable at the moment. There is no such thing as IFC4 import certification either, which makes the use of this format still a bit limited in most of the cases.

Currently, the best option is to use IFC2x3 and explode these elements into Building Element Parts. This way, the parts will preserve material and can be used for Information Takeoff.

Regarding Solibri issues, please always use the latest version as they are constantly developing and improving their IFC4 support. Furthermore, we are going to let them know about this issue so that they will be aware whenever they come to a point to implement this material-component connection and come up with a solution for this matter.

I hope this information will answer your question! Feel free to ask me again if you have any concerns about it!

Thank you very much, and have a great day!

Best regards,
Minh

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Mon, 15 Jun 2020 21:25:18 GMT

Hi Minh,

Many many thanks to you and your colleague for your work!
I'm really glad you to do this work that quickly: you are really great!

Waiting for the new release!

Best regards

Re: Component Name in IFC

Minh Nguyen — Tue, 16 Jun 2020 10:12:48 GMT

Hello,

Thank you, too, for raising your concern regarding this! We are aware of such issues thanks to your comments! I hope that it will be addressed soon.

Have a great day!

Best regards,
Minh

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Tue, 29 Sep 2020 22:29:20 GMT

mnguyen wrote:
Hi,

Thank you very much for your question! This was a very complex topic, it took us quite some time to get to the bottom of this.

For IFC4, we've implemented a solution that connects Building Material information with the different Components of the element. This solution has even become an IFC4 standard so that all IFC4 models should work like this. However, Solibri can't handle material information with their IFC4 import, and in general, we can say that Solibri's IFC4 compatibility is not very stable at the moment. There is no such thing as IFC4 import certification either, which makes the use of this format still a bit limited in most of the cases.

...

Best regards,
Minh

Hi Minh!

I'm afraid to disturb you, but I tried some other IFC4 exportation and, even with AC24, the result looks the same...

Did you implemented the feature in ARCHICAD 24? And how does it work?

Many thanks for you attention!

Re: Component Name in IFC

Minh Nguyen — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 07:44:20 GMT

Hello,

Thank you for the question!

Could you help me to clarify a bit more about what you would like to achieve here?
As I can see in the previous conversation, the issue was with Solibri's IFC4 compatibility. Are you still having it with Solibri?

Thank you very much!

Best regards,
Minh

Re: Component Name in IFC

vdentello — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 15:22:13 GMT

mnguyen wrote:
Hello,

Thank you for the question!

Could you help me to clarify a bit more about what you would like to achieve here?
As I can see in the previous conversation, the issue was with Solibri's IFC4 compatibility. Are you still having it with Solibri?

Thank you very much!

Best regards,
Minh

Regarding Component Quantities, There's an issue in Archicad Exporting logic. Whenever you opt to "Explode" all compoments to Building Element Parts, walls that were not composites in Archicad will STILL bring a "Component 1." Prefix before area.

The result of this is that you can in no way add up similar materials in solibri if you happend to model it in a case where it didn't need a composite.

Why? Because the property from Building Element Parts is called "Area" and Archicad will name properties from Elements that had a single element as "Component 1.Area" even though they don't have a Component 2.

Re: Component Name in IFC

Minh Nguyen — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 08:15:08 GMT

vdentello wrote:
Regarding Component Quantities, There's an issue in Archicad Exporting logic. Whenever you opt to "Explode" all compoments to Building Element Parts, walls that were not composites in Archicad will STILL bring a "Component 1." Prefix before area.

The result of this is that you can in no way add up similar materials in solibri if you happend to model it in a case where it didn't need a composite.

Why? Because the property from Building Element Parts is called "Area" and Archicad will name properties from Elements that had a single element as "Component 1.Area" even though they don't have a Component 2.

Hello,

Thank you for sharing the issue and I am very sorry about the experience!

Unfortunately, this is currently a limitation of the workflow. We are working on how to better address this in the future releases of Archicad. What you said is totally valid: when the element is exploded (and for Basic elements), we shouldn't have a prefix at all, since it doesn't make sense to use Component1 when there's no other components.

We have raised this issue again to the development team, hopefully, this behavior will change soon! Thank you very much for your understanding, and once again I am very sorry for the inconvenience!

Best regards,
Minh

Re: Component Name in IFC

squall_tmo — Wed, 21 Oct 2020 10:41:11 GMT

Hi Minh!

Many thanks for answering!

I hope this "feature" will be developed soon, because QTO with external software is quite impossible right now by using IFC4.

Thanks again!

Matteo

Re: Component Name in IFC

wjakubowski — Mon, 05 Sep 2022 11:02:51 GMT

Hi!
I've got additional question to this topic. Is there a way to do the same in AC22? 'Explode all elements into parts....' with 'Material Preservation'?
For now, we've got 'Component 1-5' etc.