Tuesday 25 June 2013

BIM4Real Takeaways

Last week I attended a unique one day BIM workshop called BIM4Real.
Why unique? Because it was...

  1. an event organised by three (Graham Stewart @ Ramboll, Ray Purvis @ Atkins and Rob Clark @ Excitech) of #UKBIMCrew for #UKBIMCrew
  2. a free event without any hidden 'marketing' agenda
  3. an event focusing on the reality of BIM rather than all the fluff around it
The event was invitation only and was well attended by Architects, Engineers, Contractors, Clients, and an OBE (Old BIM Expert that is). In fact there were some 'unofficial' OBEs in the room.


My takeaways of the day:

  1. Employer's Information Requirements (EIR) is a must have document on any BIM project
  2. Information Manager role should be carried out by a Design Lead until a Main Contractor is appointed. The Main Contractor should undertake Information Manager role upon appointment or appoint a member of that project team to carry out the Information Management task.
  3. Design team should work with 'clash avoidance' in mind as part of their day to day 'BIM' work; removing the need for a third party to perform 'clash detection' for the team. This is not to say that we don't need overall/project wide Information Management.
  4. IFC, there are still some reservations in the industry mainly due to software vendors' implementation of it. Most of attendees expressed their concerns about loosing information (graphical and/or non-graphical) when exporting IFC from different sources.
  5. COBie, still a concept. May not be practical on complex / large jobs. Personally, I yet have to see a useful case study where COBie and data drops are used throughout the project life cycle as COBie is intended to be used.
  6. Asset Information, It is still not clear where, how, who adds these information. Is it useful to *manually* add this information in BIM model and then extract it into a COBie or is it better to *manually* add this information straight into COBie or Asset Management database and link 3D BIM geometry to it? Personally, I *think* the later is more useful and efficient.
  7. LOD, a detailed breakdown of BIM model elements such as AIA is preferable specially for responsibility matrix; i.e. who own concrete stair, slab etc. and what point the ownership is transferred
  8. BEP, BIM Execution Plan is the most important document and should be an evolving document starting it's life as a Pre-Contract document (mainly design team, client and QS involvement led by the Design Lead) and then becoming Post-Contract document once a Main Contractor is appointed (involving design team, key sub-contractors, client, QS MC etc, led by the Main Contractor)
  9. BEP, QS's input is useful to define modelling requirements for quantity take-offs
  10. Main Contractors input/involvement in overall BIM process is paramount. Design team should start sharing their models with Main Contractors like they do with design team members, with caveats if required, to encourage contractors' involvement. 

Thanks @StewartGH1970, @Clarkrob and @RayPurvis for organising this event. Look forward to see more of this.

Thursday 13 June 2013

Calling Future Construction Leaders

I usually don't advertise for anything on my blog but I thought I share this advertisement with my blog readers mainly for two reasons:

  1. Giving construction graduates an opportunity to join one of the most rewarding (in all aspects) graduate scheme in the UK
  2. Giving construction graduates an opportunity to join a graduate scheme with well mapped out career development paths including BIM/VDC integration
 If you are interested then click on the following image to download the leaflet and follow the process specified. Good luck!




Tuesday 11 June 2013

BIM in Daily Commuting Life

Metro newspaper is part of daily commuting life in London and other 50 cities in the UK and has the distribution of up to 1.3 million copies everyday.

As usual, today I was commuting to work in the piccadilly line reading my copy of Metro. To my delight I saw word BIM in an article. Albeit in an advertisement, it is a sign of BIM going mainstream here in the UK. Here is an extract from the page for non-Metro readers.

Now it's time to get real about BIM!:-)

 "...delivering construction projects increasingly needs newer (digital) skills: professional who can work collaboratively, have digital BIM expertise.."





Tuesday 4 June 2013

BOLT-ONS 2014

I am pleased to release BOLT-ONS 2014 today. I have now grouped four of my Revit API plugins under BOLT-ONS.

BOLT-ONS is a collection of Revit API tools developed to enhance efficiency in some day to day Revit tasks.


BOLT-ONS include following commands.

1)  Update Door From/To Room Information - Updates From/To Room information in door schedules

2) Occupancy Load Calculator - Calculates occupancy load for each Room and Area objects based on occupancy load factor specified

3) Custom Area Calculator - Calculates custom area for each Room and Area objects based on custom area factor specified - ***NEW in 2014

4) Room Sheet Generator - Generates Sheets for each room in an active project - ***NEW in 2014



NOTE: Occupancy Load Calculator and Custom Area Calculator included in BOLT-ONS support ROOM and AREA objects.

Go to BOLT-ONS page to get further details.
Please leave any comments/suggestions you may have on BOLT-ONS page.