I am in the process of upgrading our families for Structural Framing and Structural Columns to allow us to use the Structural Connections.
I realise that I need to use the certified families to allow connections to be used.
Using the OOTB UB-Universal Beams (AS 3679_1) as my starting point, I recreated my UB family.
Testing of this was fine, behaviour was as expected and the structural connections worked for my new family as they do for the OOTB family.
So all good.
Moving onto the next family, UC’s, I thought I would be smart (probably my first mistake), and do a ‘save as’ of my new UB family to UC.
This just saved me the time of setting up the new custom parameters / reference planes / symbolic lines etc,
I also ensured that I matched the section shape in the properties to match what the OOTB UC family was, so I swapped it from I-shape Parallel Flange (which it was from the UB family) to I-shape Wide Flange.

So my new UC family is matching all of the parameters as the OOTB family, even though it began life from a UB family.
Everything works in the project environment as it should, except for the Structural Connections.
I am only able to get the generic connection for my new UC family.
When I use the connection on the out of the box UC, I have multiple options. Doing the same process with my new UC family (using same sizes), I only get the generic connection.
It would seem as though my workflow of saving as to a new family (and swapping out section shape) seems to break the structural connection functionality.
The simple solution is to recreate my framing/column families using the respective certified families as my starting point/template.
However, does anyone have any thoughts or ideas on why I cannot use my preferred workflow?
Thanks,
I realise that I need to use the certified families to allow connections to be used.
Using the OOTB UB-Universal Beams (AS 3679_1) as my starting point, I recreated my UB family.
Testing of this was fine, behaviour was as expected and the structural connections worked for my new family as they do for the OOTB family.
So all good.
Moving onto the next family, UC’s, I thought I would be smart (probably my first mistake), and do a ‘save as’ of my new UB family to UC.
This just saved me the time of setting up the new custom parameters / reference planes / symbolic lines etc,
I also ensured that I matched the section shape in the properties to match what the OOTB UC family was, so I swapped it from I-shape Parallel Flange (which it was from the UB family) to I-shape Wide Flange.
So my new UC family is matching all of the parameters as the OOTB family, even though it began life from a UB family.
Everything works in the project environment as it should, except for the Structural Connections.
I am only able to get the generic connection for my new UC family.
When I use the connection on the out of the box UC, I have multiple options. Doing the same process with my new UC family (using same sizes), I only get the generic connection.
It would seem as though my workflow of saving as to a new family (and swapping out section shape) seems to break the structural connection functionality.
The simple solution is to recreate my framing/column families using the respective certified families as my starting point/template.
However, does anyone have any thoughts or ideas on why I cannot use my preferred workflow?
Thanks,
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