topic How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer? in Modeling

How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

lopezfigueroa — Mon, 06 Oct 2025 18:16:59 GMT

I installed the new version of ArchiCAD 29, including MEP Designer, and I couldn't rotate the valves in either version.....
Is it possible or not?

Operating system used: Windows 3000

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Gabor Szelei — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:40:44 GMT

This is a terribly important question in an ARCHITECT design program... 😉

I apologize...

Gábor

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:58:32 GMT

Are you trying to rotate the position of the inlet and outlet?

In which case, isn't that to do with the path of the route (pipes).

Or are you trying to rotate the handle on top?

If so why?

What difference will that make?

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Claudiu Serban — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 19:54:25 GMT

I don’t get the hate. It’s a question about the new MEP functionalities of 2025 releases.

for Barry: he is probably trying to achieve the former. When pipes are mounted on a wall, the valves are turned towards the user.

this is the Wikipedia picture for valve. This is probably what he s trying to achieve.

To try to answer the question, probably you need to create a duplicate of the valve object and add your own custom functionality to it.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

mthd — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 00:44:13 GMT

You are getting a rotating handle in the horizontal plane. And you are not getting one in the vertical plane, is that right ? If so here is an older training video about the free rotate tool. I am not sure if this is applicable with connected MEP objects but worth a try if you can find the tool if it still exists that is ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObpIFkgoN_0

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 00:45:30 GMT

@Claudiu Serban wrote:

I don’t get the hate. It’s a question about the new MEP functionalities of 2025 releases.

for Barry: he is probably trying to achieve the former. When pipes are mounted on a wall, the valves are turned towards the user.

this is the Wikipedia picture for valve. This is probably what he s trying to achieve.

To try to answer the question, probably you need to create a duplicate of the valve object and add your own custom functionality to it.

Sorry, no hate.

Just trying to work out what the original poster was trying to do.

For some reason I completely missed the red arrow indicating that the whole valve needed to be rotated vertically.

I was looking at it as rotating just the valve handle.

As the valve is an object, it appears that it can only be rotated in the horizontal plane.

No matter what angle the pipe is at (horizontal, vertical or sloping), the valve will only rotate horizontally.

I don't see any options in the valve to rotate any other way.

Maybe someone more familiar with MEP design can answer this.

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

mthd — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 00:48:03 GMT

Can a MEP valve be converted to a morph and then rotated in the vertical plane ?

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 01:16:46 GMT

Sure, but it will no longer be a MEP valve.

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

mthd — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 04:11:49 GMT

Found this resource below about rotating elements and objects. This might help to show what can be and what can’t be done.

https://community.graphisoft.com/t5/Getting-started/Rotate-Elements-in-3D/ta-p/303889

We should certainly be able to rotate objects in the vertical plane by now, without having to resort to converting them to morphs or purchasing other expensive add on tools.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

strangeday — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 08:46:04 GMT

Hello @lopezfigueroa, it seems to me a bug, infact if you choose the rotation inside object parameter window, the rotation is permitted at at pre-established angles(0°,90°,180° and 270°), and also the preview reflect this modification, but if you click ok nothing changes.....

probably someone at GS could give us more information about this

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Gabor Szelei — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 07:50:29 GMT

This was for me Barry.
This is not hate.
The only thing that is strange to me is that if someone designs MEP, why doesn't they do it with a program specifically for that? And why does Graphisof have to devote resources to MEP when Archicad is declared to be an architectural software. Even the useless thing that is much more important than this is whether I can adjust the handle of the kitchen cabinet... Not to mention the structural design nightmare 😉

If the many important things that would help ARCHITECT design had been solved, which we have been asking for for years, I wouldn't say a word, but I still feel a lot of lack with the latest version.

Gábor

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 09:04:22 GMT

It seems to be reading that value from the pipe.

In a horizontal pipe it is 0° (with options available - but it won't change).

In a vertical pipe it is 90° (with no other options - but it still won't change if you type another angle).

If you select the valve settings before you place it. this rotation angle is greyed out.

That makes me think it is getting the value from the pipe.

I see no way to rotate the pipe though (around it cross section).

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

strangeday — Wed, 15 Oct 2025 15:40:57 GMT

HI @Barry Kelly, you're right, the parameter, and the ability to modify it, change as the tube's inclination varies.

But at this point, why make the rotation option available if it's not editable?

I still think it's a bug, or at least that even after three versions, the MEP elements haven't been fully adapted to the new MEP 2.0 system, keep in mind that with the old MEP, this parameter worked perfectly with the option to choose rotation around the tube's axis.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

lopezfigueroa — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 12:38:01 GMT

The valve can't be rotated around the pipe axis... This is a nuisance because if you have to place the pipe under a slab or ceiling, the valve should be positioned at 180°, otherwise, the valve will collide.
The ArchiCAD 29 presentation is very nice, but these details are what ruin the entire marketing effort.
I really hoped this detail would be ready for launch.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

marcoariveross — Wed, 08 Oct 2025 15:25:01 GMT

This worked "fine" in the preview; it was the first thing I tried...now it's disappointing that it was in the release. It was manual, but at least you could. What did they do?... 😩🤡

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 00:59:11 GMT

If this work in the tech preview (or beta) but not in the final release, then be sure to report it to your local support.

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

JohnR — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 05:59:40 GMT

rethat’s what I do…then save it as an object in needed regularly. Another option is to bring it into modelport and make adjustments there.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

JohnR — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 06:02:22 GMT

Save it as an mep part, not object.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

Barry Kelly — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 06:13:38 GMT

But you would need to script it as a MEP part if you want all of the MEP functionality.

Barry.

Re: How can I turn a valve in Archicad 29 or MEP Designer?

mthd — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 06:23:32 GMT

That is a good work around for those that use modelport. Or save it as a MEP part as you suggested below.

Still we all should be able to natively rotate any element or object in the vertical plane with Archicad. I do have CI tools Objective as part of my deal. I needed to use it to rotate a mini orb metal sheet that I downloaded off the internet that was used in lining a raked ceiling plane.