Revit Checking for Corrupt or Problem Families

There are lots of reasons that file corruption can occur, but when checking a model for problems, one of the things I do is export the families in the model to see which ones have issues as well as to see which ones are overly large.

This is not a complicated process, but it is one that needs to be monitored since it will require intervention when it runs into a family with problems. This can also be time consuming depending on the number of families in the model and how many have issues.

You may want to open your central file detached to perform this operation.

How to Export the Families
First create a folder to export all the families into.
In the project browser, go to Families, right click and Save and browse to the folder you created for the exports.
This will save a copy of each file with the file name.

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Helpful Tip
I recommend leaving your mouse pointer over the lower left corner where the progress bar is while it is exporting…I have had better luck with being able to see the name of the family it stops on that way for some reason. If for some reason you still can’t see the name you can check to see what the last exported family was and name it exported after familyname, then go back and rename it after all are done.

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What to do when it runs into a warning
When Revit stops exporting a family due to a warning you will need to note what the family name is, then expand the warning dialog and export it with the family name. This will give you the information you need for each family that needs to be fixed.

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Export and save the html file with the same name as the family.

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After you save the file you will need to choose an option to move on to the next family to be exported. I generally choose Remove Constraints rather than OK…but I will leave that to you to decide.


Repeat this process until all families have been exported. Keep in mind, this only exports component families not system families.
Once all the families are exported go through the html files to fix the damaged families and reload into the project.
The html file will give you the element ids affected by the warning.

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Oversized Families
Once the families are exported you can arrange them by file size to see which ones could use some trimming.


It is preferred that the maximum file size be under 1 mb. I know that is expecting a lot for some families, but anything over 2mb should be investigated and trimmed down as much as possible or rebuilt if necessary.

About the Author

Sherry Pittman

Sr. Technical Support Specialist, Building<br><br>Sherry is a certified Autodesk Building Solutions Technical Support Specialist at IMAGINiT. She has been a speaker at several AUGI Cad Camps and a co-speaker at Autodesk University. She is also a certified expert in Revit Architecture. She has 30 plus years of experience in the Architectural field and supports all the Autodesk Building Solutions software. She began her career with us as an Application Engineer conducting training, product demonstrations, and implementation services. She now focuses her knowledge and dedication to the National Solution Center here at IMAGINiT.

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