Coordination – Linking – Copy / Monitor

If you haven’t yet done some coordination between the Architect and Structural engineer in Revit here are some tips.

You can only copy monitor:

• Levels
• Grids
• Walls
• Floors
• Columns

Copy / Monitor is a two way process. One of the parties will do the original creation of the category elements and the other will copping. Example: The Architect controls and creates the Levels and Grids, and the Engineer creates the structural walls, floors and columns.
The monitoring will work both ways, but there is slightly different privileges the users will have, depending on if they are the original creator or copier of the element. I say privileges in regard to work correctly within the copy / monitor workflow.

Original creator privileges:

• Change type and element properties
• Modify the Profile or Sketch
• Move Element
• Add and edit Openings

Copy / Monitor Element user privileges:

• Change type and element properties
• Modify the Profile or Sketch
• Move Element
• Edit openings but cannot add openings using the opening tool. The only way to addopenings is to edit its profile or sketch.

So what does this mean?
Let’s say the Engineer creates a structural floor and the Architect copy / monitors it.
The Engineer can draw the floor, create openings in it using the shaft tool, change the type properties, and edit it’s sketch.
After copy / monitoring the floor the Architect can change it’s type, edit it’s sketch shape, move it, even edit the shaft openings the engineer has created, but if the Architect is to put an opening in the floor (using the shaft opening tool), it will not transfer correctly to the Engineers drawing.

Just remember you only copy monitor items both parties need to track. For a typical building I would suggest the following, but remember, you need to review this in detail before every project. All projects will be a little bit different.

Levels – Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Grids - Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Walls - Architect creates them – Structural Engineer Copy / Monitors them.
Floors – Structural Engineer creates them –Architect Copy / Monitors them.
Columns – Structural Engineer creates them –Architect Copy / Monitors them.

Now it is taken that in the original Architectural model they will draw the floors and columns, but when the Engineer comes on board they are deleted and the copy / monitored from the engineers model.

Copy / Monitoring does take up a lot of processing power and memory so only copy / monitor what is really necessary, Share the process between both parties, Ensure your worksets are set up so the other party can unload the irrelevant categories using worksets, and lastly make sure your model not bogged down by bad maintenance of Review warnings.

Change in the air

So “Change” is the buzz word at the moment for all kinds of reasons. In the past few weeks in Australia the financial global down turn is hitting home. There are a lot of local large and medium size firms letting Architects go. There obviously are a lot of nervous people and they are right to be. This may only be the beginning.

But clouds have their silver linings. All of a sudden the AutoCAD users in our office that were not willing to put any effort into learning Revit, suddenly are starting to show interest. The word on the street is: “If you find yourself looking for work, having Revit on your résumé is a major advantage”.

From an Architect’s office point of view, changing how it works during boom times can be very difficult. Making changes during difficult times is a matter of survival. BIM is now advanced enough that firms don’t have an excuse not to change. Time will tell, but I recon the next two years will be the biggest take on time of BIM in Australia.

Exactal’s CostX

I was lucky enough to see a demonstration on the construction cost estimation software “CostX” by Exactal. This software really allows Quantity Surveyors (QS) to enter the BIM age with little to no effort. It is very good at handling dwg files but DWF files are it's forte. It grabs all the meta-data from the DWF file and organises it. Because it understands the ID data of elements is able to relate a plan element to the same element in elevation or section. It really is an amazing tool.

It has some little futures for calculating areas that Autodesk could learn some lessons from. What is so good about CostX is that a large amount of the QS firms in Australia use CostX.

For us (Revit Users) the only important thing to do is to give your QS 2d DWF files over PDF or DWG. Ensure you tick the options box for export object data for model elements. CostX does not recognise rooms yet. It is another great reason to start using DWF files.

Autodesk University Podcasts.

You may not have been aware, there are several Autodesk University lecture podcasts, free and available to subscribe / download in the iTunes store podcast list. Just do a search for Autodesk. Some of these are very good and are a good way to add to you knowledge of Revit and BIM.

NavisWorks – JetStream v5

I was showed a demo of NavisWorks, JetStream v5 earlier this week. In a nut shell, it is an all encompassing review tool, with the extra ability to review the construction program. NavisWorks has bought by Autodesk earlier this year.

The big plus to the software is the amount of different file formats it can import. RVT are one of the very few file formats that can not go directly into JetStream (there is currently a plug-in for Revit if you have a copy of JetStream). I would be very surprised by the time Revit 2010 comes out, that there won’t be a direct export from Revit, and or JetStream being able to import rvt files.

The other big plus is JetStream being able to link in a Microsoft project file and assign different component to the construction program. This allow you to do clash detection of the construction process itself.

JetStream is currently being used to coordinate Oil Rig so our building are easy in comparison.

Have a look at the workflow demo on the NavisWorks website. I’m not sure if Architects will use JetStream itself, but it is an ideal tool for the contractors.

Green Building Studio

Green Building Studio is now up and running very will if you are doing a project in the United States. However the rest of us, we are going to have to wait till at least April or May of 2009 before the service will work properly outside the U.S.

In order to know this, obviously I had to ask Autodesk. So they gave me the above answer but added, you can always use the service and place your building in a comparable environment to your project location in the US. I some how don’t think he or she had much in-depth knowledge of sustainable building through out the different parts of the world. The obvious thing about Australia is, being in the southern hemisphere everything is nearly backwards, as well as being one of the most unique environments. Anyway, in the mean time, our Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) person and I will be doing some testing in pretend US projects to be ready for when the service does come on line. In general it does look like a good site.

It would be nice to get the most out of BIM and sustainable design.

Facilities management at Sydney Opera House

I’m a little late off the mark here, but I found this very interesting. The Facilities management of the Sydney Opera House are using BIM (Building Information Modelling) to mange the building.

There is a fully report on the website you can down load. In this instance they are using ArchiCAD as the BIM platform.