The Uncharted Territory of BIM
The experts, Andreas Kohlhaas from the consulting firm GSP Network and Dörthe Knefelkamp from WAGO, discuss the opportunities and challenges of digital construction.
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Building Information Modeling
“BIM is a great challenge”
Andreas Kohlhaas from the consulting firm GSP Network views BIM as a major opportunity for everyone involved in construction. However, in order to actually implement the digital planning of buildings, companies like WAGO would have to perform a great deal of preparation.
Greater Safety and Regulation
“Building Information Modeling” (BIM) has gained considerable attention in the past three years; however, a clear view of the effects of BIM on planning and construction cultures remains elusive. At its fundamental level, BIM describes new methods for how stakeholders and skilled trades workers can collaborate. The foundation is an informational model of the building composed from many specific areas: It contains information about the building structure, components, scheduled materials and products, which would allow for the derivation of other values, like monitoring costs or deadlines.
The BIM method can be applied across the entire life cycle, or implemented in steps. Big BIM indicates that 3D building models are structured by specialty or room, and the data are provided and used by everyone involved in planning, construction, and operations. BIM thus offers the potential to provide all relevant information, graphically and alphanumerically, to respective stakeholders in specific phases, from pre-planning up to the end of life cycle.
Greater Safety and Regulation
One measurable advantage in integrated, model-based planning lies in the prevention of duplicate efforts, since the technical models created by the building designers are used directly by specialists when scheduling their actions. This prevents some of the redesigning that is often required.
It also facilitates plausibility and collision checks, and includes technical calculations in the planning process. Which in turn enables realistic simulations of usage and energy efficiency before construction, and implementations of optimization measures on the digital model. The component-oriented construction model in the BIM method thus guarantees a high level of planning safety and controls costs during construction and building operation.
There are currently no discussions in Germany regarding a comprehensive implementation of BIM. While guidelines for using BIM have existed for years in Scandinavia, the Netherlands, and Great Britain, BIM remains in its infancy in Germany. One study, conducted by the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering (IAO), showed that only 29% of the participants worked with component-oriented 3D models in their organizations, and that only an additional 10% planned to in the future. And yet, even the Little BIM, that is, software for generating sectional drawings from a 3D model, can enormously increase efficiency in planning – even within a single organization. The numbers are even lower for Big BIM, which involves the exchange of partial and technical models based on open standards like IFC (Industry Foundation Classes, DIN EN ISO 16739). The integration of construction workflow planning and simulation – or 4D BIM – is only used by 6% of participants, and is under consideration by only another 7%.
Andreas Kohlhaas, GSP Network
Uncertainty during Planning
Common guidelines and processes are currently only under development by organizations like the VDI, whose guidelines were only published last year, or are awaiting publication this year. Another aspect is that international guidelines for implementing BIM in Germany are expected from ISO, CEN, and DIN (DIN EN ISO 19650).
Therefore, design companies and construction firms still question whether they can use existing software for BIM, or if they should invest in new or updated versions. The answer depends on whether the software manufacturers have implemented a data exchange interface in order to facilitate importing, referencing, and exporting technical models. Then, the participants could follow the open-source BIM approach and use open-source data standards, like “Industry Foundation Classes” (IFC DIN EN ISO 16739) or de facto standards, like “Green Building XML” (gbXML).
Preparing for Digitalization
Many demands on software products, which the BIM method requires, are only being defined now or arise from current BIM projects. Many gaps in the digital process chain remain, and people are waiting for their implementation. In addition, construction suppliers must prepare corresponding data for their products and make it available for processing by the design software.
This is a large challenge for software providers, as well as construction suppliers and component vendors for technical building systems or electronic products, because the guidelines and standards for classification and data exchange are still in the development phase.
Planners and construction suppliers also need to know that BIM is not a magic wand that will solve all problems on an ad hoc basis. Yet companies still need to become involved at an early stage in the issues, the challenges, the processes and the responsibilities, and also communicate within their sectors to promote the digitalization process. The digitalization of the construction industry will arrive – even in Germany. In 2015, the Federal Ministry for Traffic and Digital Infrastructure announced a phased plan for "Digital Design and Construction" for the use of BIM in public infrastructure projects.
Personal Information
Andreas Kohlhaas is highly regarded as an expert in “Building Information Modeling” (BIM). In 2013, with a graduate degree in physics, he founded the consulting firm GSP Network GmbH, where he is currently the marketing manager. Kohlhaas is a member of several committees related to BIM, and also provides extensive instruction on the topic.
“A Solid Component of the WAGO Strategy”
The prerequisite for BIM is adapting standards and the optimization of product data for digital processing. WAGO Building Expert, Dörthe Knefelkamp, sees the company as a trendsetter.
As a producer of electronic components and building automation products/solutions, WAGO is already involved with digitalization in the context of “Building Information Modeling” (BIM) to satisfy target groups – operators, designers and construction companies – in the future.
Software providers, architects and committees are driving the topic. Information has appeared across various media outlets. Examples based on architecture and support structure models are often referenced. The term, “building services,” combines all of a building's technical equipment. And this is where many of the trades find themselves: Collectively, they remain at different points in the implementation of the BIM requirements with respect to standardizing the data formats and contents of their building system.
Both building automation and electrical installation systems are still in the fledgling stages. Thus, it is a challenge for WAGO, as a vendor and construction supplier for products in these building systems, to optimize the technical data for BIM processes at this point in time.
Internationally, one can recognize different degrees of BIM implementation. Some countries, like Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany, would like a high level of implementation. It is thus possible in digital reference modeling to derive technical models with suitable levels of information for specific functional and quality checks, in addition to collision checks, or to link them to the reference model.
Open to Both BIM Approaches
BIM is and remains a solid component in WAGO's digitalization strategy. This is, however, linked to specific challenges. According to the demands of digitalization, WAGO, as a provider, must maintain transparency in its technical product data, and maintain and provide new attributes that arise from developing specifications.
There are two paths for this: On the one hand, there is the Closed BIM approach, which some software producers have successfully taken. This includes, e.g., Autodesk with Revit, which currently has the highest market penetration in Europe. With Revit, users can provide the digital information about their products in the an “RFA format.”
Advantages for software that follows the closed BIM approach include optimized interfaces and reduced data loss through discontinuities in media format. The product's technical information is defined by the manufacturer and there is no mandatory requirement for corresponding to a standard. As Revit currently has broad dissemination, WAGO also makes its digital product information available in RFA format on its PARTcommunity server.
The second path leads to Open BIM. There are various software programs that follow this approach and thus enable data exchange via open-source interfaces, like “Industry Foundation Classes” (IFC) or “Green Building XML” (gbXML). Open-source, standardized interfaces and formats offer the advantage that the designer is not limited by the software, and that the data correspond to a structure and format, regardless of manufacturer.
Dörthe Knefelkamp, WAGO
Active in Adapting to Standards
Currently, the standards (IFC) for technical building services are still being adapted to the demands of various levels of implementation. WAGO supports the VDMA/VDI working group in the expansion of VDI 3805 “Product Data Exchange in Technical Systems Engineering” with a page on building automation. The results of this working group should flow through VDI into ISO 16757, “Product Data for Building Services System Model”. There is currently no comparable group in electronics for adapting the standard to the desired level of implementation. However, the idea for one is being spread widely.
WAGO will continue to follow both BIM approaches and, in exchanges with its customers, also incorporate industry demands. This approach will lay the groundwork for future alignment with BIM. BIM will surely influence the entire construction industry and generate radical change. WAGO will support its clients in implementing BIM, now and in the future.
Personal Information
Dörthe Knefelkamp, Market Manager Building Installations, began working at WAGO in 1998. After studying Industrial Electrical Engineering while at the company, she worked for International Project Service before accepting a post at a climate protection agency in 2010. In 2015, she returned to WAGO and now works in Building Market Management with a focus on WINSTA® and energy management.
The Different Faces of BIM
Not all BIM is the same, and the methodologies differ:
- Open BIM is characterized by the exchange of BIM files between disciplines, regardless of the BIM software used. This is performed by using open-source interfaces and requires both transparency and the exchange of information between various models.
- In Closed BIM, all designers work on a project using the same software.
- Big BIM indicates that 3D building models are structured by specialty or room, and the data are provided and used by everyone involved in planning, construction, and operations.
- In contrast, little BIM describes the use of the BIM method, but limited to one discipline, and is thus an isolated solution. A typical example is the generation of a virtual architectural model without the possibility of sharing the data with another discipline.
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