By Dennis Collin
The new Toposolid element introduced in Revit 2024 was a step forward in some ways over the old legacy toposurface element. However, in certain instances the resultant toposolid element could be overly complex depending upon how it was created. As a result, a new simplify solid option is now available for the 2024.1 release.
This function can be accessed by selecting the toposolid entity and choose to simplify toposolid. A dialogue will appear asking what percentage of points defining the solid should be retained. It defaults to 80% but this can be adjusted as desired.
Once confirmed, a simplification algorithm is applied and the element will optimise the number of points as per Figure 1. Care should be taken with the optimisation process as I have found it will impact on total volume and accuracy of cut and fill value, but as with any ‘optimisation’ process this should be expected and since cut and fill calculations are not a major issue for many Revit users, but model performance is, this trade-off should be weighed accordingly. The optimised toposolid will reduce the complexity of the model and should improve performance in terms of open, save and visual navigation performance.