Problem
You would like to test your factory_girl factories in the rails test console, but you get an error when you try to use an existing factory.

Solution

1. Start your console in the test evnivornment:
   rails c test
2. require your factories.rb file in the console:
   require 'absolute_path/to/your/factories.rb'
3. you should be able to use your factory now :
   t=Factory.create(:existing_factory_name)