Showing hidden lines of in-place Families.

Quite often In-place Families families don't show their hidden lines and the show and remove hidden line tools are disabled when the graphics style is set to hidden line.

Strange but true.

If you switch the view discipline from Structural to Architectural then these tools are enabled.

Apply the hidden lines by first clicking the object you want to see through, then the object you want to see under.

Remember to switch your view back to Structural afterwards.

Want to change the Material of an already created Mass ?

If you have ever tried to do this via the Element Properties you would get the dialogue boxes shown below: As you can see no hint of how to change it's material ....

To change the Material you need to set up a parameter in your Mass which is easily done. Select your Mass then choose the Edit buttonThen go to the Extrusion Properties where you will see the Material defined as . Just to the right is a little button to "add a parameter". Select this button and you will get the Associate Family Parameter dialouge.

Select Add Parameter and fill in the Dialouge box as below:

Then OK a few times and Finish Family.

If you now look at the properties of you Mass you will have an option to change the Material