Passing a range from one VB function to another - excel

Question

I'm writing a few VBA functions for work and ran into a problem that should be easy to solve, but somehow I can't manage to, despite my best attempts at finding an answer here and on Google. I wrote a function that should give me the range between two strings in a column:
Function FindRng(StartRng As String, EndRng As String) As Variant
Dim TopOfRange As Single
Dim BottomOfRange As Single
TopOfRange = WorksheetFunction.Match(StartRng, Sheets("InfCom").Range("B:B"), 0)
BottomOfRange = WorksheetFunction.Match(EndRng, Sheets("InfCom").Range("B:B"), 0)
FindRng = Range(Sheets("InfCom").Cells(TopOfRange, 2), Sheets("InfCom").Cells(BottomOfRange, 2))
End Function
So if the inputs A and B are on rows 100 and 105, it should return B100:B105. When I test this by adapting the code to read FindRng = Range(...).Address, I indeed get $B$100:$B$105.
However, when I then input the result of FindRng into a customized Index Match function, I get an error. The function is as follows:
Function subsetPBPC(rngReturn As Range, LookupValueH As Variant, TopOfRange As String, BottomOfRange As String, LookupValueV As Variant) As Variant
subsetPBPC = sPBPC(rngReturn, LookupValueH, FindRng(TopOfRange, BottomOfRange), LookupValueV)
End Function
The problem is that it seems to read the output of FindRng not as a range, but as the content of that range: when I use the Evaluate Formula tool on FindRng embedded in another formula, it shows the output of FindRng as {A,B,C,D,E} instead of $B$100:$B$105, where A to E are the contents of the cells in the range. I have the feeling the solution is really simple, but I don't see it. The functions underlying the customized Index Match function have been tested and all work like a charm.

Answer 1

Set instead of let. Let assigns the value of an expression to a variable. Set assigns an object reference to a variable. You want to return a reference to the range object, not return the value produced by the range object's default property.
In VBA writing
FindRng = Range(...)
is implicitly writing
Let FindRng = Range(...)
However you want
Set FindRng = Range(...)
Edit 1:
It is quite important to understand the difference between an object reference and a value in VBA. This is a similar concept to passing arguments by value or by reference. Hopefully these two links help some:
The Let statement on MSDN
The Set statement on MSDN
Edit 2:
Oh, and I guess I should touch on default properties! Some objects like range have default properties. If you treat the range as a value instead of an object, it uses the default property instead of throwing an error because it's an object not a value. In the case of range the default property is Value. So if you say A = Range("A1") what you're actually saying is Let A = Range("A1").Value when you might mean Set A = Range("A1"). So you're getting the value contained in the cell A1, instead of a range object representing that cell.

Answer 2

Picking up that your current code should both
use Set as per AndADM's commnet
dimension SetRng as a Range rather than Variant
you can simplify your function as below (which may save time if you are calling it repetitively)
Also, you could test for this range being Nothing (if your two strings werent found), whereas you current code will error out if either string is missing.
Function SetRng(str1 As String, str2 As String) As Range
With Sheets("infCom").Columns(2)
Set SetRng = Range(.Find(str1, , xlValues, xlWhole), .Find(str2, , xlValues, xlWhole))
End With
End Function