IfcFurnishingElement

Definition from IAI: Generalization of all furniture related objects. Furnishing objects are characterized as being

• pre-manufactured and assembled on-site, or
• manufactured on-site (built-in)

Thus furnishing elements can either be movable, or not (as the built-ins).

HISTORY New entity in IFC Release 2x.

Geometry Use Definitions:

The geometric representation of IfcFurnishingElement is given by the IfcProductDefinitionShape and IfcLocalPlacement allowing multiple geometric representation.

Local Placement

The local placement for IfcFurnishingElement is defined in its supertype IfcProduct. It is defined by the IfcLocalPlacement, which defines the local coordinate system that is referenced by all geometric representations.

• The PlacementRelTo relationship of IfcLocalPlacement shall point (if given) to the local placement of the same IfcSpatialStructureElement , which is used in the ContainedInStructure inverse attribute, or to a spatial structure element at a higher level, referenced by that.
• If the relative placement is not used, the absolute placement is defined within the world coordinate system.

Geometric Representations

Any IfcFurnishingElement can be represented by one or several geometric representations. This includes the general representation types 'BoundingBox', 'GeometricCurveSet', 'SurfaceModel', 'Brep', and 'MappedRepresentation' being defined here.

Bounding Box Representation

Any IfcFurnishingElement may be represented as a bounding box, which shows the maximum extend of the body within the coordinated system established by the IfcLocalPlacement. The bounding box representation is the simplest geometric representation available. The following attribute values for the IfcShapeRepresentation holding this geometric representation shall be used:

• RepresentationIdentifier : 'Box'
• RepresentationType : 'BoundingBox'

Foot Print Representation

The foot print representation of IfcFurnishingElement is given by either a single or multiple 2D points and curves. The representation identifier and type of this geometric representation are:

• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationIdentifier = 'FootPrint'
• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationType = 'GeometricCurveSet'

SurfaceModel Representation

Any IfcFurnishingElement (so far no further constraints are defined at the level of its subtypes) may be represented as a single or multiple surface models, based on either shell or face based models. In some cases it may be useful to also expose a simple representation as a bounding box representation of the same complex shape. The representation identifier and type of this geometric representation are:

• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationIdentifier = 'Body'
• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationType = 'SurfaceModel'

Brep Representation

Any IfcFurnishingElement (so far no further constraints are defined at the level of its subtypes) may be represented as a single or multiple Boundary Representation elements (which are restricted to faceted Brep with or without voids). The Brep representation allows for the representation of complex element shape. In some cases it may be useful to also expose a simple representation as a bounding box representation of the same complex shape. The representation identifier and type of this geometric representation are:

• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationIdentifier = 'Body'
• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationType = 'Brep'

MappedRepresentation

The IfcMappedItem should always be used in appropriate cases as it allows for reusing the geometry definition of the furnishing type for all occurrences of the same type. The representation identifier and type of this geometric representation are:

• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationIdentifier = 'FootPrint', or 'Body' (depending of the representation map)
• IfcShapeRepresentation.RepresentationType = 'MappedRepresentation'

EXPRESS specification:

Inheritance graph