Week 4 BIM Discussion - BIM makes the Engineer's Jobs Harder vs. BIM makes the Engineer's Job Easier

BIM has made the engineer’s job harder because there are greater expectations of the engineers to multitask, collaborate, understand others disciplines, perform non engineering tasks, build increasingly complex buildings, using multiple sophisticated programs. Fear of missing a mistake made by the computer. BIM also makes an engineer’s job easier and allows them to get more done at a higher quality because of the complexity of BIM and its capabilities. It removes the tedious design  tasks from what the engineer normally does and indicates where they need to pay attention. The easy problems are solved automatically, but the complex problems are not. Designers are able to make better building designs and gain a realistic understand understanding of the building by making collaboration, communication, and visualization easier, but leads to more complicated problems.

B3 - (GROUP B) - Matthew Zabiega

                BIM software is almost essential to any design firm as it allows for easily visualization, editing, collaboration and planning of the project. REVIT is arguably at the forefront of the BIM software. “Revit has now and will become more deeply integrated with the core of planning, conceptual design, detailed design, fabrication, and operation of our built environment” [2].  However like all things, nothing is perfect and REVIT certainly is not perfect.  Probably one of the biggest problems REVIT faces, it probably its biggest key feature; it is so incredibly complex almost to the point that no one is an expert. A REVIT model can be designed with huge amounts of detail, features and families, but the problem is to teach a new employee or teach a student. The learning curve varies from person to person, it may take a few hours watching tutorials and taking it out for a test drive before you can start ‘designing’ something incredibly basic. Once you feel like you have the hang of it, you hit a wall and have to ask questions (if there is anyone to answer) or watch another tutorial/buy books.  This process is almost repeated infinitely.

                Another problem I personally experienced is also another big advantage of REVIT; multiple people working in the same model at the same time. A REVIT model, if located on a server, can be accessed by numerous amounts of people that can work on the project simultaneously. Every now and then (more now than then) you have to save and reload the project to make sure you are seeing the most up-to-date model. This can present a relative big problem is someone either: goes a long time without saving/reloading, or tries to edit the same structure/family someone else is trying to edit. For the first problem, the work that person has just done may be over-written and possibly lost if someone has edited the space around it. For the second problem, if you edit a something in the model that someone else has already edited, it could cause the model to glitch, blend the edits or even crash. This requires a lot of planning if multiple people are working in the model at the same time, one way around this is to divide the work up so that no two people are working on the same thing.

                Sometimes REVIT is stubborn, anyone who has used REVIT can more than likely agree. The task may be simple but REVIT will not allow you to create that pipe connection, or connect those walls. A funny personal example happened at my last co-op, I was given the job to update the edits in a REVIT model. One thing I had to do was replace a 60 degree pipe take-off with a 45 degree take-off and then reconnect the pipe. For whatever reason it was, REVIT would not allow it. Fast forward 2 hours later, with our departments 2 best REVIT designer and the actual head of the REVIT department (person who is really good at REVIT), crowded around my cubicle, trying to figure out why REVIT would not create that connection. No Clash-detection. Check. No interference. Check. No turned off layers clashing. Check. Elevation and view correct. Check. No one could figure out what the problem was. It was becoming more of a personal dilemma for the designers to figure out this ‘simple’ problem. They ended up finding similar objects around the model, copying and dragging them into the needed place.

                Something that seemed so simple just took four people three hours to accomplish. Sometimes REVIT does not budge and you have to improvise. The REVIT software is always being advanced, there is a huge difference between REVIT 2012 and REVIT 2016 and I am sure REVIT 2017 will be even more glorious than the previous.

Sources:

1: http://aecmag.com/technology-mainmenu-35/450-the-trouble-with-bim

2: http://www.seandburke.com/blog/2014/03/29/is-revit-dead/

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B2 - (Group B) Matthew Zabiega

                As defined by himms.org (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society), Interoperability is “the ability of health information systems to work together within and across organizational boundaries in order to advance the effective delivery of healthcare for individuals and communities”. Interoperability, although typically for health information, can be used by other fields of expertise.  There are three levels of interoperability: Foundational, structural and semantic.

                Foundational interoperability allows one information technology system to exchange data to another information technology system which can receive but does not have to interpret it. Structural interoperability allows for uniform movement of data from one system to another such that the data is preserved, unaltered and can be interpreted at the data field level. Semantic interoperability allows two or more systems to exchange and use the information that has been exchanged.

                The use of electronically transmitting data has a very basic, yet valuable aspect. It eliminates the need to manually copy data which can be time consuming.  This ensures that the data that is transmitted is more exact and pure than anything that can be manually copied due to human error.  If copied wrong by human error, it can prove disastrous as it can lead to repeat previously wrong work or have multiple copies of the same work with minute changes.

                Moving on to the BIM world, Revit is what I believe to be the program that utilizes interoperability the most (from experience at my last co-op).  Revit can hold vast information and very detailed models that include every system of a building or structure. This information does not have to come from one source, multiples models can be opened on different computers and the model will update via information exchange. The new data is uploaded and transmitted to all other computers with that model opened. This greatly improves that speed at which projects can be completed because multiple people, from different fields, can work in the same model. The electrical engineer can work on his system in the model when the mechanical engineer is working on his system in the model and they can both see one another’s work (if they choose to). Unlike AutoCad, all of the systems of a building can be viewed in one coherent model that can be scanned to see of any probable errors that could arise when construction begins. This can save a huge cost percentage because plans would have to be redone much less because the error was caught early on.

                Although Revit uses interoperability in its infancy (it’s still one model uploaded on a server), the communication aspect is still present. Communication can be slowed by large models (typically over 300MB) and can present problems while sharing data. One personal story while using Revit at my last co-op was when a project was at its 90% completion and was on its way out of the door. Our company had just gotten the model back from a sister company in another country, so one of our lead designers was going through and reviewing the work. It turns out that the work was incomplete and over-all bad. In the following few days, we had over 20 engineers and designers in the live file at the same time. For a while it was working well, but as more and more people began saving and reloading the current model, the system lagged and some data was not uploaded to some computers which in turn caused clashes in the model which had to be fixed. This problem is belittled compared to the advantages that interoperability can give a program.

Sources:
1) http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/ebookviewer/ebook/bmxlYmtfXzM2NDIzOV9fQU41?sid=da4563e0-e15d-4cf3-8b8a-eee24671dc73@sessionmgr113&vid=0&format=EB&lpid=lp_99&rid=0
2) http://www.himss.org/library/interoperability-standards/what-is-interoperability

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B2: Group A- Janet Tran

BIM Tools and Parametric Modeling

                      The significant distinction between Building Information Model (BIM) software and Computer Aid Drafting (CAD) tools are the ability to input parameters determined by the user.  These parameters allow one to attribute unique identity among objects within a family, while also commanding constraints. Constraints can relate to relationships with other objects, geometry, dimensions, etc. Unique identities for specific elements can also be attributed such as: airflow, velocity, lumens, etc. The hierarchy of these objects and elements are referred to as families, which share specific common attributes.

                       A critical benefit of parametric-modeling is its ability to increase productivity, mainly for construction documentation value. Traditional drafting software requires manual edits that often result in human error. However, BIM software allows global changes to take place automatically. This dramatically reduces the effort in making small changes that may occur during the design process. For instance, when the change in a duct size changes on one sheet view (for purposes of construction documentation) it will also change in all sheets related to that change. This is especially notable because time can be expended on design rather than drafting.

                       From a contractually point of view BIM software such as Revit can also help to reduce patent and latent ambiguities in these drawings that serve as contract documents. In “Successful Contract Administration For Constructors and Design Professionals” by Charles W. Cook, BIM is referenced as a tool that in its development can help with coordination. As building become more complicated and new types of systems such as: security, telecommunications, etc. are involved coordination becomes crucial. Various designers can work within the same model and coordinate the way in which systems interact to prevent “crashes”. Warnings are displayed in parameters do not meet buildable conditions. This is because Revit allows for a 3-dimensional explicit representation of the building, whereas 2D traditional CAD software can only provide an implicit model. Another advantage of Revit is the intelligence to formulate quick schedules for contractors to process cost estimations.

                       Expanding beyond Revit, software that allows for quick input an generation for energy and design analysis is called Trane TRACE 700. It enables users to input information on a building and create a baseline model to be compared with various other types of mechanical system. This allows designers to make important decisions and know the implications of various systems for an optimal design.

                      Some shortcomings of BIM software today are a result of its ability to model a large amount of details. With so many systems modeled in one central model, the capabilities of such software have surpassed the available memory and processing power of contemporary computers. However, it is believed that these issues with naturally decreases as computers get faster. Additionally, the complexity of the software results in a bigger learning curve, which take a longer time to gain proficiency.

Sources: 

[1] Eastman, Charles M. BIM Handbook: A Guide to Building Infromation Modeling for Owner, Managers, Designers, Engineers, and Contractors. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley, 2008. Web. 

[2] Cook, Charles W. Successful Contract Administration: For Constructors and Design Professionals. New York: Routledge, 2014. Print. 

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