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IFC Parsing Setup (IFC PS)

IFC Standard

The IFC standard is quite open and versatile. Each BIM application exports IFCs in its own way. Usually, it's not straightforward to detect things in IFC files. This is why we need IFC PSs.

The IFC PS is the information we need to understand your IFCs. A company can have several IFC PSs. You will need to select one of your IFC PSs for each project.

There are two types of entries in a IFC PS:

  • Part categories: Those are entries we need to classify parts into categories (wood profiles, plates, nail lines, ...)
  • Part properties: Those are entries that help us find property values in parts (a zone, a milling depth, ...)

IFC props and values

Usually, our system tries to detect part names and values with a case insensitive criteria. So, for us, it's the same "Reference", "REFERENCE" and "reference".

Part categories

For each category you have to add one or more entries that need to match somehow the information of your parts. Each entry has:

  • IFC Prop: The IFC property to look into.
  • Type of match: Whether we need to find values that match exactly or only the prefix.
  • Value: The value to look for in the property.

Example

If you add following entries to the "Top Rail" category:

IFC PropMatchValue
REFERENCEALLTOPRAIL
REFERENCEPREFIXTR

The system will consider as Top Rails parts with "REFERENCE" values such as: TOPRAIL, TR12, TR, TR45.

But will never detect: TOPRAIL2, TOP_RAIL, 12TR.

Top Rail Wood

The top rail of a panel.

Bottom Rail Wood

The bottom rail of a panel.

Extra Top Wood

Woods over the top rail, usually built after nailing the studs.

Extra Bottom Wood

Woods below the bottom rail, usually built after nailing the studs.

Wood profile

Other wood profile parts.

Plate

Plates in a panel.

Frame Nail Lines

Nails in plates. Group of frame nails represented as a line. The line goes through the heads of the nails.

Frame Nail Singles

Nails in frame. Single nail represented as line. The line goes through the body of the nail.

Plate Nail Lines

Nails in plates. Group of frame nails represented as a line. The line goes through the heads of the nails.

Milling

Milling lines.

Plate Screw

Lines representing screws in the same way as the "Frame Nail Lines".

Sawing

Sawing lines.

Hidden Material

Hidden materials, that can be hidden in the 3D viewer if configured this way in the interface settings.

Glue lines

Glue lines for bricks.

Bricks / Stones

Single bricks/stones.

Part properties

This is simpler than categories. Foe each prop we need one or more entries that tell us what is the property name to look for.

Each entry needs only an IFC Prop.

Example

If you add following entries to the "Zone" property:

IFC Prop
WorkPlane
Layer

The system will find the following zones for each part:

Part"WorkPlane""Layer"Detected Zone
P1121
P2UNDEFINED33
P31UNDEFINED1

It picks the first that matches.

Zone (layer)

The part panel zone/layer.

Reference (we expect same reference for same shape)

This is an ID that's expected to be the same across parts with the same shape. It's usually generated as "reference" in Tekla Structures but can exist in other applications IFCs

Nail/Screw CTC

The Center-to-center distance in nail and screw lines.

Mill/Saw depth

The milling/saw depth in a milling and sawing line.

Brick Type

The type of the brick.

Comment

Comment of the part.

Finish

Finish of the part.

Bricks: Machine Brick Flag

Brick that is not manual but machine built.

Milling: V-Mill Flag

Milling line that needs to be done as V-Mill.