Creating a Grade Beam in Revit Structure: Step-by-Step Tutorial

Hello, and welcome back to Revit Structure. In our previous videos, we placed elements in our structural model—columns and walls. Now it's time to place foundations beneath them.

But first, we need to create a grade beam for our earthquake-resisting elements, since Revit does not provide one in its basic library. So let's get started. Go to the Application Menu.

Select New > Family. This opens a dialog box for family template files. We want to select the Structural Foundation Revit template file because it provides the basic framework we need for creating this foundation.

Let’s pick it and open it. This takes us to the Reference Level. On this level, we’re shown an intersecting set of reference planes.

This intersection is the insertion point for our grade beam in the model. To begin, let’s create new reference planes that will define the extent of the grade beam. Go to Reference Plane.

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Draw a reference plane anywhere—it doesn’t matter at this point; we’ll define its location later. Place one above the centerline, one below, one to the right, and one to the left of the centerline. Now we need to assign dimension information to define these planes.

Go to Dimension. Select the top, center, and bottom lines. What we want to do is create an equal offset between these lines.

Repeat the process for the vertical lines: left, center, and right. Assign an equal offset there as well.

Next, we’ll define the Width and Length of the grade beam. Select the first reference line, then the outermost vertical reference plane. Repeat for the horizontal planes (out-to-out).

Press Escape to exit the command. At this point, we have lines defined with dimensions, but they aren’t parametric yet. Now we’ll assign parameters to make these dimensions adjustable within the model.

Select the first dimension. Go to Label, and assign it the parameter Length. This will define the length of the grade beam.

Select the second dimension. Since we’re viewing this from above, assign it the parameter Width. Now we’ve given our grade beam general parametric information. The next step is to create the physical shape of the grade beam.

So go to Create > Extrusion, and choose Rectangle in the Draw mode. Just create a box inside the reference planes. Now we want to align these lines with the reference planes.

Go to the Align command under Modify. Select the first reference plane and the corresponding line. Make sure the lock symbol is activated.

Now the line is tied to the reference plane. Repeat this process for the remaining sides. Don’t forget to lock each alignment.

This is important because when you assign a parameter-driven dimension, the line will move accordingly. Press Escape to exit the command. At this point, we’ve created the basic shape we’ll see in the top view of our grade beam.

Now we want to assign depth, which we don’t see in this view. So go to an Elevation—we’ll use the left face of the grade beam. Now we’ll draw a reference plane downward and stretch it to define the bottom of the grade beam.

Next, find the extrusion again. Before aligning, we’ll draw another reference plane to represent the bottom of the grade beam. Then we’ll define the top reference plane as well, if not already in place.

Now we need to align the top and bottom edges of the grade beam to these reference planes. Press Escape to exit any active command. Go to Align, select the bottom reference plane and the bottom line of the extrusion, and lock it.

Then align the top reference plane with the top line of the extrusion and lock it. (The horizontal constraints were already set in the Reference Level view.) Press Escape again, and now we’ll add control to manipulate these vertical dimensions.

The reference level corresponds to the floor plan level where this grade beam will be placed. Go to Dimension, and place a dimension from the reference level to the top reference plane.

The exact value doesn’t matter at this point—it will be defined later. Add another dimension from the reference level to the bottom reference plane. Press Escape.

Now we need to assign parameters. Go to Label, and note that we currently have only two parameters: one for Length and one for Width. We’re going to add a new parameter.

This opens the Parameter Properties dialog box. Name this parameter Offset from Finished Floor.

Set it as a Type parameter rather than an Instance parameter. This allows us to create multiple types of grade beams and modify them across the model. Now assign this label to the first vertical dimension. Since we don’t yet have a parameter for depth, we’ll add another one.

Name this parameter Depth. This allows us to define the depth of the grade beam per the engineer’s design specifications. Now we’re finished.

Let’s Save the family and store it in our folder. We’ll name it Grade Beam. Save—and there you have it.

We now have a grade beam family. This is important because now we can manipulate its parameters.

Select the family and assign a value. Let’s enter 3'-0"—now we have a 3-foot-wide grade beam, equidistant from the insertion point. We can do the same with the width parameter.

Select it and change it to 6'-0". Again, the geometry remains centered on the insertion point. Now go to the left-side elevation of the grade beam, select the offset parameter, and set it to 1'-0".

This places the top of the beam 1 foot below the finished floor level. Then assign a Depth of 2'-0".

We now have a grade beam that is 2 feet deep, as our initial insert into the project. Do you want to save the changes? Yes. Now the family has been created. We’ll wrap up this video here, and we’ll see you in the next one.