Those that are currently modelling their reinforcement in 3D already know the advantages of automated bending schedules. In this tutorial you can see a method of checking your rebar against codes that ensure that the bar can be fabricated and bent to the shapes and lengths specified.
This aspect is often overlooked and can be a useful tool to validate your work and provide simpler methods of checking the model. In the image bellow you can see a screen capture of a ‘3D checking view’ that shows unchecked rebar in Yellow, rebar that meets design codes in green and failures in red. This data can also be shown in bending schedules to identify issues.
This is a fairly big Dynamo script that could definitely be reduced with more use of IronPython. The image below shows the overall graph. The green groups are inputs, grey is data processing and blue is outputs.
The graph begins by recovering all the rebar in the project. The bars are then separated, straight bars and bend bars.
Once the straight rebar is isolated you can then check for bars that are over stock length or do not conform to code 01 (i.e. bars that should be 6 or 12m). This is done with some simple design script such as ‘A != 6000 && A != 12000’ which effectively loops through the rebar and isolates all bars that are not 6000 or 12000.
I have then used some IronPython to create lists that store if rebars are OK or need checking and if errors are found, report on the code failure. This type of iteration through lists is much more compact using simple python scripts.
There is too much detail to show in this post but take a look at the YouTube video which will show the script running. I also step though each group so you can understand how the graph is composed.
Enjoy,
Lawrence
Autodesk Revit Structure 