BIM Round Table

7/27/2019 BIM Round Table

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The Governments 2016 deadline for Building Information Modelling compliance is rapidlyapproaching. Building Products staged a Round Table of experts, which echoed BIM itself, being a

multi-disciplinary collaboration between manufacturer, architect, contractor, consultant and client. The

meeting saw discussion of the real world needs of the industry, and showed that many issues remain

to be resolved. We discovered that while the substantial investments are worthwhile, gaining full

benet from BIM will mean full engagement, from suppliers to FM teams easier said than done.

ChairED BY

Jmes Pke

editor, Building Products

Csey D rutlnd

Associate director, Arup AssociatesCasey is an architect who has signicant experience

of working with BIM tools on a wide range of projects,and combines this with a realistic business approach.

Steve Cookson

Technical services manager, liquid applied membranes, Sika

Steve has worked in the roong industry for 18 years, in

roles ranging from CAD technician to his current position.

He represents technical company policy at all meetings.

Fnk Welng

Head of technical, engineering and design, Mets Wood

Frank has a wealth of sector knowledge from many years

of specialisation. A structural engineer, he leads the rms

technical team, and led the way in its BIM development.

Pul Evns

Head of marketing, Celotex

Paul is responsible for the insulation manufacturers

innovation and new product programmes, as well as all

marketing communication campaigns.

Dvd Glles

Product marketing manager, automatics, Dorma

David is the senior specication sales person at the

door controls specialist manufacturer, and is also the

rms BIM Champion, as it develops its strategy.

Pete Teblcock

Director of BIM, Balfour BeattyA qualied architect, Peters responsible for implementing

BIM across Balfour Beatty Construction Services. He wasvice president (Membership) of the RIBA from 2001-2003.

Lm Bdy

Town Hall complex client programme manager,

Manchester City Council

As part of his key role on the 100m refurbishment, Liams

in charge of exploring how BIM data can benet the city.

Smon rwlnson

Head of strategic research and insight, EC Harris

As well as his role at EC Harris, Simon is a member of the

core group of the Governments BIM Task Group, and is

working on alignment of COBie and commercial data.

Pul Woddy

Author and consultant, White Frog Publishing

A former application specialist at Revit, Paul is now an

independent BIM consultant and trainer, and advises major

international design and construction companies.

Jon Wlson

Technical manager, Lakesmere

Johns the lead on BIM within Lakesmere, developing

design standards and procedures, delivering models to the

client, and analysing BIM tenders.

The Building Products Round Table

BIM: From Theory to Practice

SPONSOrS


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BIM might well be the panacea for achieving these efciencies,

but there appears to be a growing gap between the cognoscenti

and the stragglers. In the 2013 National BIM Survey, only half of

those already using BIM have reached the Governments Level 2

requirement, and 22% of those surveyed who werent yet in the

club said that they didnt want to be.

What do suppliers need to do in order to full their contract with

clients and contractors, what are the new KPIs? And are we really

ready to share everything?

The Round Table looked at BIM in practice, including lessons from

real schemes, and found that not only issues remain around data

delivery from manufacturers, but theres a critical need to engage the FM

side. The potential improvements in product specication, and efciency

generally, are enormous, but it seems we are a still a long way from

achieving them all. The meeting was a key step towards that goal.

Round Table | BIM: From Theory to Practice

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The Round Table was held in the auspicious surroundings of the headquarters of our

oldest army regiment, the Honourable Artillery Company, just off Londons City Road.

The contrast between this grand old Georgian house, hidden away next to the silicon

roundabout home to many new web-based companies couldnt be more striking.

That contrast between old and new echoes the challenges being faced around BIM by

many rms in the construction industry, who have for decades found ways of designing and

operating buildings, or their components, which work for them. However those time-honoured

ways are now facing a daunting challenge from the Government, as it demands everyone

involved in delivering its projects to be fully conversant with 3D (Level 2) BIM, by 2016.

However, for the smaller or more sceptical companies out there, is the investment really

worth it in the current climate, or is it that they cant afford not to be in the game? Theopportunity was outlined by Paul Morrell, then Governments Construction Advisor, in 2011,

when he stated that public sector construction is worth around 35-40bn, but that the quid

pro quowas that the industry had to achieve a 20% saving in procurement.

IntroductionJmes Pke, edto, Buldng Poducts, nd c of te BiM round Tble


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C: Pt of te Govenments Constuc-

ton 2025 Sttegy s to buld mnufctues

compettve dvntge usng BiM, oweve

wt s tt compettve dvntge cuently

is its cost-effectiveness for rms in the supply

cn estblsed, so tey cn justfy te

nvestment? Pete, youe skng you suppl-

es to be fully convesnt wt BiM by 2014,

wee do you see te etun on nvestment?

Pete Teblcock: Weve been working with our

supply chain for the past 18 months, sharing our

vision for where wed like to go, and offering to

work very closely with them to understand the

technology, the mechanics. Government has made

its vision clear, that they are looking at projects

to be compliant with a certain set of COBie data.So were gearing up, preparing for that, and our

suppliers have a role to play, in satisfying the clients

data needs.

For us, the basic properties and attributes of

materials is probably all that we need. One of the

benets of BIM and also one of the dilemmas is

that its a fantastic digital toolset. I think thats

what a number of companies might be wrestling

with. You can provide the basic attributes of

materials, you can also provide the manufacturing

data, built in.

Question is, if that manufacturing data was

included, simply because it could be, in all projects,

for every component, youll have a pretty unwieldy

memory-hungry model to deal with, and not all

clients want that level of detail.

So its wrestling with the various needs of the

people around this table, versus the clients who are

turned off, because they dont need the data that

relates to manufacturing; what theyre looking for is

data that relates to their maintainable asset.

C:Are you having conversations with suppliers

about what the savings are likely to be to them?

PT: We are having conversations, rather than

about specic savings, in terms of workloads. For

instance we are seeing suppliers supplying us with

relevant BIM information that can dovetail into the

other models, whether its a doorset, ceiling or

services. It means the project is better integrated,

better coordinated. We see inherently therell be

less rework, less defects, less visits to site, and

efciency savings. They will be different depending

on the size and scope of the project, for our suppli-

ers, but we see that inherently its a more efcient

way of working, that will more than pay for the

investment. We see the gures you quoted earlier

[30K investment to become BIM compliant] being

exceeded by some way.

C: John, whats your attitude at Lakesmere to

return on BIM investment now is it a case of you

cant not be involved?Jon Wlson:There are many different pieces of

software out there, so we have to be quite versa-

tile and exible to be able to use them. Theres a

good collaboration of zones and things like that

we can work within. That reduces requests for

information, for example, going out to the client.

Weve been using 3D models to get collaboration

going with clients and also our suppliers, for the

last six or seven years. We see BIM as just an

extension of that, its a matter very simply of just

putting together an O&M (operation and mainte-

nance) manual.

The problem that we tend to have is understand-

ing the level of detail required by the clients. That

is a concern. Instead of drawing a prole do you

want a box, do you draw every screw? Were also

nding that there isnt a BIM document coming

through, or generally after a projects awarded a

client will say they want BIM. We are quite happy to

be exible, there are things we can do to pull it into

the software.

Generally when we are tendering for a project,

that information is not really there. So over the

past 12 months weve developed our own BIM

standard.

C: Steve, at Sika do you believe theres a

dangerous lack of clarity on data requirements?Steve Cookson: Theres not been much

clarication on what the market needs when it

comes to level of detail. Do you want screws and

outlets, or is it just the simple components and

their properties?

If theres not some clarity soon on this, there is

a danger around the 2016 deadline. We are one

of the rst manufacturers to be on the National

BIM Library, and there arent many listed in the

coming soon section of the website. From speak-

ing to other people, there is a lack of direction, its

screaming out for the supply chain to get involved,

but the lack of clarity of whats demanded of us

there doesnt seem to be any documentation

saying whats needed from manufacturers.

C: Liam, as a client, do you see that clarity

currently coming from the client side?

Lm Bdy: I think theres a complete lack of

direction at the moment. Clients need to show

more leadership, and some of the big FM compa-

nies need to join the game. Im seeing very little

proper engagement with the use of BIM for FM.

Theres nothing in the employer requirements

about BIM, but weve good historical partnership

arrangements with our partners. Its been a difcult

journey to articulate what our requirements are,

because a lot of it has been done on the hoof.

It is for clients to show leadership but I do think

the FM world do need to engage more in this. We

are surrounded by people who are brilliant with the

technology, but its about the culture, getting the

FM service providers on board. Getting them to

interact with the designers, and saying look, you

can inuence the design, is a massive task. At rst,

they didnt believe it.

Pul Woddy: Is that something thats changed

with BIM, is it not a culture thats always been

there?

LB: If you look at Latham and Egan in the 1990s,

they were great words, especially about frame-

work partnering, and there have been some goodresults. But I think we are very silo-based in our

way of working, and the recession is really biting.

We have a fantastic partner in Laing ORourke, but

they are cutting their cloth.

In terms of handovers we are trying to embrace

the Governments Soft Landings approach, and

thats a bit of a rocky road to be honest. We are

really working hard as a team, and Ive got no

criticism of the individuals at Laing ORourke, but I

think they are just spread a little too thin, which is

maybe just a reection of the market.

The FM are one foot out of it. They shouldnt be,

they should be closer.

PW:To assume that the FM guys are going

to be involved from the beginning is wrong.

If each object contains FM information at

concept design stage, then the model becomes

completely unworkable.

C: There are a lot of challenges to integrating

everything at the front end arent there?

LB: There are massive benets, but people

shouldnt underestimate the difculty. Weve been

around and seen loads of different contractors

very forward thinking ones, but if the clients not on

board, theyre passing the baton to nobody.

Smon rwlnson: Regarding the competitive

advantage to manufacturers, if you look at the earlyadopter projects, one of the direct savings a client

can achieve is to take out the cost of manually

updating a whole lot of information into FM

systems. But in a sense having FM suppliers opting

into that is turkeys voting for Christmas, because

If manufacturing data was included,

simply because it could be, for every

component, youll have a

pretty unwieldy memory-hungry model to deal withPeter Trebilcock,

Balfour Beatty


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this is a big upfront revenue generator for people to

set up contracts by plugging in data. BIM is saying

in this instance, were going to take that away from

you. You could say thats not in the FM industrys

interests. On the other side, we probably havent

been able to articulate what the contractors role

in creating that FM asset is, and you can see a

few contractors responding to that, and extending

themselves into creating that asset.

Manufacturers who provide data that can enable

contractors to cost-effectively create those FM

assets are going to be in a better position to secure

those contracts than those who arent. So we

seem to be opening up a new area of differentiation

and based on evidence from recent work weve

done for BIS and supply chain, most contractual

relationships with suppliers at the moment are

very cost driven. So something which says there

are people who cant engage with this because

they dont have the data, they dont have it in the

formats we need, that means these people are no

longer in play, at least for a period. That is a quite

powerful source of potential advantage. Its beingarticulated well by the industry and the opportu-

nitys obvious.

Regarding levels of detail required, Steve has

identied a really big challenge. The Government

BIM Task Group which I sit on has started to do

some very early prototyping on that; if you visit the

Labs section of the Task Group website, there

are Demand Matrices which are organised on a

detailed structure within a piece of work called

The Digital Plan of Work. Its starting to map out

the levels of detail and how the information might

be used. But this is two people doing some very

early work to get the industry engaged. We have

received no feedback from manufacturers at all.

Here is Government-funded work, quite well publi-

cised, its there for comment, as a starter for 10,

and the industry needs to engage, even to say we

dont understand this at all.

Thats a challenge for us around communication,

and this event is a good opportunity. The thinking is

being developed, but at the moment its fairly techy.

Csey D rutlnd: The Digital Plan of Work is

setting a framework for how manufacturers objects

from manufacturers should work in terms of apply-

ing data and geometry to product libraries. I think

its important that what we are trying to do is to

remain comparable and competitive. Theres a lotof work going on with the Construction Industry

Council in creating the Speciers Product Informa-

tion (SPie) templates so you can easily compare

one boiler, data-wise, to another. Thats a massive

task; therell be different parameters for data for all

product types.

Some of those data elds are contained within

the COBie spreadsheet format anyway. Its got

to happen and itll happen slowly, and theres no

easy way to tell every manufacturer how to create

these.

C: Is there a need for fairly user-friendly but

detailed guidelines?

Sr: If youd asked Christiaan Barnard when he was

trying to work out how to do a heart transplant,

can you come up with some user-friendly guide-

lines, hed probably say can we work out how

were going to do it rst? Its still quite complicated,

although there are some relatively simple analogies

we use. But actually then trying to articulate levels

of detail, what you need at different stages, you

need a whole load of people of people to engage

in that conversation. Its the whole industry coming

together and starting to say what they need.

My analogy of how BIMs going to operate is

a massive white board weve got some bits

populated with post-its, people saying this is howwere going to do this bit, weve a got a reason-

able idea of how one or two projects might be

delivered. But people will be doing it differently on

different projects.

Its great that people are saying we need this

common standard, now the question is how

does a collection of industries gather together to

write that?

PW: I agree, and there is a lot of naivety in terms of

what that specication is going to look like from the

road map of that level of detail. I think a lot a lot of

people assume that more is better, and thats just

not the case. And what I see a lot is manufacturers

trying to drive down to screws and nuts and bolts,

and more info, and the designers constantly trying

to pull back away from that level of detail.

There are certain bits of information which are

relevant at concept but which are irrelevant as you

move through the process. So the curve we see in

terms of what information is relevant at each data

drop is not a smooth line. Once a fancy 3D model

thats accurate with all screws and colours with all

data attached arrives at FM, the amount of informa-

tion has tailed off considerably.

C: Casey, is that tailing off happening within

real schemes?

CDr: No, its not. It does work both ways, there is alot of data we use at concept stage that is irrelevant

at FM point. But equally there is some performance

data that we need there, that is lost throughout the

process, which the FM guys could benet from

they might be replacing a door within a wall that is

two hour re rated as a whole, but the door doesnt

need to be, because its in a different zone.

C:Youre quite a fan of having a larger amount

of data than not, arent you?

CDr: More information is good, if you know how

to use it. If youre simply bloating things with data

as soon as you can, its not going to help anyone.

Im in two minds if its an issue whether models get

too big or not we build stadia and multi-storey

towers, and with the way technologys moving

I wouldnt get too fussed about how large the

models are becoming.

Linked databases are separate, the point is it

needs to be linked in to the model the model

needs to be geometry, and really, how much detail

do we need in the geometry? It just needs to be a

place holder. It needs to look nice for architectural

images, for us to convey ideas to clients and win

a job maybe. Inherently if we use a manufacturers

objects in order to build a scene and sell an idea,

theres already too much information in there data-

wise for the contractors to use.

We dont necessarily want the FM data then,

and if its in there, well just ignore it you havent

really dealt with it at that point.

C:There isnt really guidance on this aspect

though is there?

CDr:There is and there isnt. Reading through

PAS 1192, it says this is what we need at this

stage, Im a huge advocate of using the American

Institute of Architects E202 document that says

this is the information that can be relied upon at

this stage. Ive used that as a layer beneath PAS

1192 and the BIM protocols, because it goes more

granular. For example, it says because its a tube

station, we would prefer at Stage 2 to have loadsmore information on the substructure, because the

door knobs really dont matter right now, or the

walls above ground; the cost is in the foundations

of the building. If you ip that on its head, and say

youre building a data centre, you need loads of

information at Stage 2 about the MEP.

Its project-specic, we need to be able to

work through it project by project and say heres

a template, what does the client need to make

decisions at each stage?

LB:Theres too much obsession with capital

cost in the specication and not enough focus on

whole-life cost. Whats it going to give to the client

for 25 years? We need to look at the big picture,

and involve FMs. Im convinced that we should be

using more BIM tools to select product, consider-

ing whole life costs.

One of the direct savings

a client can achieve is

to take out the cost of

manually updating a whole

lot of information into FM systemsSimon Rawlinson, EC Harris


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PW: But is there not the inherent danger that infor-

mation that is contained in a model too early has a

risk associated with assumed design?

LB: Its context.

CDr: Thats where the E202 [American Institute of

Architects guidance] comes in.

LB:You might be identifying whats not acceptable.

PW:Yes, but if youve chosen a door handle at

an early stage because it looks nice rather than

its performance factors, all of which are included,

then is somebody else going to look at that model

and assume that that door handles been chosen

because of its performance?

Sr: Im absolutely with you on that one, and I

dont know how the products industry responds to

this, because thinking on procurement is moving

towards organisations like Balfour Beatty being

asked to deal with outputs of performance, over a

life. The Governments Soft Landings approach is

moving towards greater assessment of perfor-

mance in use.

Somebody assuming that a product is whats

been specied because somebody pulled an objectout of a library on the web, and then the delivery

teams dont behave as they should, ie to optimise

that component, thats a big risk.

C:The tail wagging the dog?

Sr: Yes, the one we could nd suddenly

becomes the spec. We have seen examples

of quite detailed design in some BIM-driven

procurements which have probably limited

contractors opportunities to improve perfor-

mance. Somebody species one component

then it has a knock-on effect.

Unless you are absolutely explicit that this is a

performance-specied object, that its exactly what

we want, how can you communicate it clearly?

CDr: In some cases you cant do that in the EU,

because you have to remain competitive to the

point where youve procured it.

Sr:You should remain competitive in all instances;

in very few instances should people be saying

I want exactly that object. Light ttings, door

handles, thats probably about it.

JW: Weve seen models coming in from architects

that just have the spec code on it, so you just have

the spec document, which may be performance-

related.

CDr: Id advocate that place-holder geometry.

PT: Can I ask, in the groups experience, how

many clients are asking for anything other than a

traditional O&M manual?

JW: Weve got one client that wants both a

straightforward O&M and a BIM model.

CDr: Out of the projects I am running, four.

Pul Woddy: A lot of clients are waiting to see

what comes, theyre not contractually requiring,

because they dont know.

LB: I think thats pretty sad, that some clients arewaiting for things to happen, weve got to show

some leadership.

One of the things weve found from some

[software] vendors, they tell you what you cant

achieve, more than what you can. It did feel a bit

like the tail wagging the dog, and we thought wed

just put our cards on the table.

Within our short term vision we are extracting

information from the model and we are making

it work with our estate management package.

We are running pilots to make sure its actually

happening. We had a session with vendors where

we got Mark Bew and Jamie Johnston of the BIM

Task Group to come up we said we didnt want

to have it with the vendors without them being in

the room, and John Lorimer (ex Manchester City

Council, now at Cabinet Ofce) came too. It was

quite powerful really, because we presented our

vision [to Concerto, Artra and E-docs], and told

them all to go and do their homework. We didnt

know what to expect from them, whether they

would work together, and they would.

Then we presented our long-term vision. Its

working for us, the way weve done it short-term,

and our FM team think its great. It is working for

us. Its about driving the market really, which is why

more clients and FM providers need to come tothe table.

BIM-Lite as an answer to client concerns?

PT: We have got a number of jobs using BIM,

and its our default position. Weve internally listed

about 60 benets half to us, half to the client. But

its a pity that half of our clients arent interested

in it. They dont see themselves changing their

operating model to conform to BIM and say why

cant it simply plug into their operating model?

The other reason given is we want a traditional

O&M manual the BIM data comes in a language

thats too complex, I dont want to go there, or I

dont want to have to buy expensive software to

access this data. These are the perceptions. They

are thinking they will have to change their whole

portfolio to comply, and havent got the budget for

the training necessary.

C:The cynical term for it might be the Not

Invented Here Syndrome?

PT:You could say that. Its why should I learn a

new language?

CDr: Its more a case of learning how to speak

English properly. Its not a completely new

language, its learning how to do it better.

PT: I think there ought to be a BIM-Lite option,

which makes it easier.

CDM:Thats exactly what were doing with two of

our clients, Broadgate Estates and Jaguar Land

Rover. They both said how do we get our informa-tion from your models to our FM systems, and we

showed them a few lines of COBie data, and they

picked the ones they wanted. So its data they will

use, they dont have to sift through hundreds of

lines.

PT: If more clients understood they can have a

BIM-Lite, thered be a Eureka moment.

CDr: Its not Level 2 compliant, but it makes their

business work!

Pul Evns: I think that view is important from

a manufacturers perspective as well as these

huge amounts of data sets that we will be asked

to populate to get our products BIM ready, if we

knew what the essentials were, you could have

a BIM-Lite. The fear factor exists in the product

manufacturing world its being left to individual

manufacturers to try and drive competitive advan-

tage through being one of the rst to embrace it.

JW: Weve had a job recently where weve had the

information from a client, just the steelwork and

the architects model, and the model has got so

unwieldy, even the clients software cant handle it.

So theyve had to split the building up, and this is

before weve put any of our information into that

model.

COBie, and other detailed issuesSr:The point was made earlier about when a

client asks for COBie COBie should sit in the

background, its a data structure, a means of one

platform talking to another. Were on that journey

where a client is saying they want the information

from the construction project in their FM system

how the industry goes about that is to some

degree up to the industry. You wouldnt want to bet

your entire future on a large Excel spreadsheet.

Youd expect a client to ask for the information

in a standard way, but I would be surprised if they

asked for COBie. This goes back to who drives

improvement in the industry is it the client or the

industry itself? Its useful to learn how other supply

chains managed to coalesce around standard

ways of working.

PT: What do the Government want at the end of

the project? Do they want models, do they want

Theres not been much clarification on

what the market needs when

it comes to level of detailSteve Cookson,

Sika Liquid Plastics


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drawings, specication, or COBie?

Sr:They want data, in COBie format, for purposes

such as FM.

PT:Theres the perception amongst a lot of clients

that its COBie or nothing, for satisfying FM require-

ments.

LB:A lot of clients including ourselves are

embracing COBie but we struggle with the logic

of it at times, because it delves into the minutiae.

I dont know if its a tad academic, but Ive got

the utmost respect for the individuals in the team

who have done it. I think the format needs to be

tailored to client needs were struggling to nd

people we can share ideas with. The information

must be user-friendly these people are running

buildings, they dont want to have to go and learn

a new trade.

I dont think its unreasonable to say the informa-

tion must be compatible with existing systems. Our

city has made a substantial investment.

Sr: We might have a misapprehension here.

COBies nothing more than a means to an end.

C: So its being misunderstood in the industry?

Sr:Yes. A worst outcome is that you have 25versions of HTML, in the analogy of designing a

website. I think the really strong message around

this table is saying you can have a lot of differ-

ent versions of COBie is against the interests of

all manufacturers, because you want to coalesce

around one standard. COBie might not be the right

standard, but its going in the right direction, so

debate around whether its t for purpose, not lets

go off and do lots of different ones.

CDr: Its the structure of the document. If you can

keep it as is and just use that as a common format

and export it as a CSV le, that can be read by

multiple different packages. Whether you complete

those columns, is a different matter, but thats my

version of COBie-Lite.

Sr: At this stage its the best standard thats

available to help people start to coalesce around

a common way of working. The PAS standard

is more around a formal set of data exchange

standards.

PW: The last thing we want is each of these FM

software providers each to go off and develop their

own communication standards of extracting data

from the model.

PT: Is there a danger that we are trying to get the

industry to become experts in COBie, rather than

somebody devising a simple system that meets

clients needs?

PW: Yes.

Sr: What we encouraging, through the Technology

Alliance for example, is to get software providers

to coalesce around providing extract/query tools

that enable you take that information out from the

environment you are accustomed to working in. If

you dont have that standard to develop against,

nothing happens, and thats the danger.

All manufacturers in this room would be

absolutely right to not do anything until a standard

emerged. Theres one get behind it, improve it,

thats where the engagement needs to be.

C: David, does COBie t your needs as amanufacturer?

Dvd Glles: We are in the very early stages,

weve only just released our BIM objects. Theres a

big reliance at our stage on someone like BIM Store

in understanding COBie requirements and what we

should put in as data.

Fnk Welng: Most problems on site occur when

the services are put in, plumbers or electricians

doing something. We have BIM objects packed

with data, Im not sure whether its too much or too

little we developed software that works with our

supply chain.

SC: It seems they are almost wanting two levels

of detail (RIBA in our case), when the spec is rst

written, and at design stage. The question I have

is what purpose does the model serve in the end,

and who is it serving?

PW:You use the word end, and thats sometimes

the confusion the t-for-purpose nature of the

model has no end; it has tness for purpose today.

As the model then progresses, some of the infor-

mation still has relevance (geometry and metadata),

other bits less so. Later it may come back that we

need more geometry again, as we start to look at

the xings and whether things t.

C: Steve, you seem to be saying that theres

still nowhere near the amount of guidance toenable you to go into the process with clarity?

SC: I attended today to learn from others, and I

will look at the Digital Plan of Work that Simons

mentioned. But BIMs in its early stages, we are all

learning.

Refurbishment, and other FM challenges

SC: What are peoples opinions of how BIM is

being used in the refurbishment market? BIM is

heavily geared towards new build in my opinion,

but whats the Governments plan for refurbish-

ment?

PT: I asked a colleague who advises property

owners, what do you think product manufactur-

ers ought to be prioritising? On refurbishment, he

said over the past 12 months hed surveyed 30 m2

of built assets, and only a handful had mentioned

BIM. Why? Because the majority of existing build-

ings dont have a BIM model. So the FM providers

are doing FM for millions of square metres without

BIM. He said therell only be a shift as BIM starts

to listen to the FM world its about essential

data and not data drops. He said they need key

quantities, the grade, size, typical performance and

warranty data, and then cleaning regimes.

LB:The big thing that a lot of FM people are

absolutely anal about is space, and BIM can help

with that. Im taking on board what Simon said

about COBie, but we are getting information from

suppliers that we dont need, they are going the

extra mile. Its very difcult for us to dictate, but Im

listening to whats been said about future compat-

ibility, and Im thinking maybe we need to take the

information and adjust it slightly to COBie format.

About retrospective BIM, we are refurbishing

iconic buildings in the city, so theres a real sense

of worth. What were trying to do is draw in some

of our commercial and nance people, get them

close to BIM. Were working on doing a lot of

case studies, with Cabinet Ofce guys, capital but

also operational ones, which will probably go upon the Task Group website. The City Treasurer is

seeing the benets; BIM helps us make informed

decisions.

Sr: 2016 is about large-scale refurb, a 50K patch

up over the summer, probably not. But this is a

volume opportunity for the industry, and in many

ways, knowing the geometry of the fabric, getting

some automation in achieving performance in

insulation, would work quite well. Some work done

in France by Saint-Gobain is effectively coming up

with an automated design application to help them

implement their fabric performance initiatives.

One of the opportunities that someone like

Sika might see is do we actually need to have an

architect to work out the best way of putting in an

If youve chosen a door

handle at an early stage

because it looks nice,

is somebody else going to look at

the model and assume that its been

chosen because of its performance?

Paul Woddy,White Frog Publishing


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upstand detail in an existing building, when we have

the survey and can automate it. No-one wants to

procure one-off solutions any more.

CDr: We originally did Broadgate Circus and are

now refurbing it, using Revit as a standard produc-

tion tool, amongst others. It would have taken us

months to survey it traditionally, but we had it laser

scanned internally and externally, and we now have

that point cloud to use natively within the Revit le.

Ive always been a big advocate of using that data

as long as you can without turning it into objects

until you absolutely need to.

Resolving software and data issues

SC: We do 2D standard and bespoke details, but

is that the level of detail thats needed at refurbish-

ment, because new build is geared around NBS,

which is a very generic outline document in my

opinion. We do go down to a much greater level

of detail on existing buildings. Is it just a case of

providing those details in 3D?

PW:The assumption is often that BIM is a prede-ned library. But theres no reason why it cant be

delivered in a bespoke way it doesnt have to sit

there and be static.

PW: Can I ask suppliers which division in your

company paid for the production of that?

SC:Technical services.

[Other suppliers]: Its normally marketing.

PW:Thats kind of where I was going that in many

respects changes the way a manufacturer looks at

the fundamental problem of BIM. Whether they are

changing their systems to use its advantages to the

maximum, or the other extreme being ticking a box.

There are plenty of places in between.

tools, and it throws up challenges. The industry as

a whole, through the technology, needs to gure

out what the common language is so that we can

all work together.

C: Revit is pretty much the standard platform,

is that right?

CDr: Its Arups primary production tool but not

everything can be created within that.

PW: I need to say Im a former Revit employee,

but it is the only tool that can successfully allow

an architect, a structural engineer and an MEPservices engineer to communicate 100% on a

project. Until we see the holy grail of IFC allowing

us to perfectly communicate between different

software packages, at the moment Revit is the only

one that covers all the disciplines.

PT: To minimise our risk and issues with interoper-

ability, it is our preference that everybody works on

the same platform. We cant always dictate that of

course, but it makes life so much easier.

C: BIM can mean several different platforms

working together concurrently, is that right?

PW: It isnt necessarily one single software source.

We shouldnt start to argue that everyone in the

industry should have to learn Revit in order to be

involved in BIM. It is about having something which

means that you can plug information in and extract

information, its not about the technology.

C: What are the current issues with compat-

ibility on projects?

PT: Loss of data.

PW: Loss of design intent. For instance, on steel-

work weve got varying standards, but unless you

know the intricacies of how those different software

applications will handle the interchange between

packages, it can have a major impact on the

design intent of the model.

CDr: There are always backups, were still provid-ing two-dimensional drawings to say this is actually

what we think it should be.

Three-dimensional views of models

PT: (Directed to Chair): Your comments right at

the beginning, that one of the drivers is efciency

savings of 20%, those savings wont be realised

while there are still interoperability issues.

DG: Are the software providers working towards a

solution in that case?

PT: I dont think theyre working hard enough;

there isnt the perfect scenario right now, so youll

nd youll lose data or somebodys unable to play

a full part in the BIM process. Youre limiting your

efciency, having to redraw, rework, redesign.

Sr: But even if one thinks that some of the biggest

gains in terms of hitting those initial savings are

around co-ordination and clash detection, you can

One of the things weve

found from some vendors,

they tell you what you cant

achieve, more than what you canLiam Brady,

Manchester City Council

PT: We are interested not only in the product, but in

the service. We want to know how you are going to

get it in, how you are going to get the waste out.

What do you need to provide? A whole host of

possibilities, for different purposes. Because there

are the assessment tools, energy tools, ow rates

that you can build in as a designer, but theres

also the data from manufacturers. I can tell you

what Im looking for, but there might be another 10

things the designer or client is looking for. Thats

the excitement but also the complexity that comes

with BIM. Its almost more to do with learning about

data management than what BIM is, its how we

manage that data that you provide, or what your

installers need to know.

FW: Its almost as if everything in the model needs

a tag, containing the information, and whoever gets

that in the model, it lters what they need.

Sr: I think thats spot on, it goes back to talking

about models being more or less populated at

different times in the scheme. Casey might need a

whole lot of stuff around U-values, but what is thepurpose and what is the information requirement

can we articulate that better and to some extent

thats what the data drops are. There are a whole

lot of supply chain data drops around coordination,

clash detection, health and safety, logistics, which

the client shouldnt have to articulate.

So when you look at some of the processes

in the PAS standard, the diagrams enable you

to some extent anticipate what clients might be

asking for.

C: Is thatad hoc or is there a national standard

yet for data drops, to get it off clients backs?

Sr: If we were comparing what HS2 need to know

compared to Ministry of Justice, you can say the

Governments term Plain Language Questions is

a generic term for heres a question that needs an

answer to get us through a gateway.

Different clients have different decision points,

so you cant have a standard that says this

will happen at this point, different procure-

ment processes will have different supply chains

engaged at different times. We could have Sika

involved right up front, so they might be providing

information really early on. I think we have to be

realistic and pragmatic around how the industry

operates. Its thinking about currency of data, how

data can help us do things better.CDr:A lot of the discussion has been about

COBie, and no one mentioned IFC [the Industry

Foundation Classes data model]. COBie is a small

part of IFC, and I think if anyones looking at invest-

ing in the future of their product libraries, to BIM

level 2 or level 3, they really need to get a grip on

how IFC works, and how the data moves from one

platform to another.

We need to end up in a position where the

data is hosted somewhere that everyone can

get to it and people access information via an

archive environment. All computing power is done

where that model is saved, so model size doesnt

become an issue; it becomes industry-standard

information.

Yes, Autodesk do have 60% of the market, but

it needs to be slightly more open than that. Arup

uses a whole range of different BIM-authoring


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bring quite a lot of that information together through

some of these proprietary tools. The initial hits/quick

wins of is the building coordinated, is the asset

coordinated, can we get a programme out of it?

can be grabbed. The later bits towards the 20% with

everybody communicating with one another are a

bit further away, so we should have people working

towards as much benet as they can get via what

are effectively the low hanging fruit areas.

PT: Yes, the challenge is where youve got a fully

integrated BIM model at design stage M&E,

CMS, architecture, but then what you want to do

is then to substitute the stair design with the actual

stair, one model out, one model in the steelwork,

M&E services, ditto. Thats where you get Oh I

work in Tekla or Im not going to change my whole

business for you. It might be wonderful in eight

out of 10 areas, but there are those two bits which

dont give you quite all the benets you might have

had with full interoperability. Youve lost some of the

optimisation.Sr: We can observe that integration of Revit with

some analysis tools that the professional disciplines

use, things such as thermal modelling, isnt perfect.

C: Is that down to the software providers to

sort out?

PW: Not necessarily, its also down to a funda-

mental issue we have in that were still contractu-

ally obliged to deliver a project based upon a set

of GA drawings and typical details. Until we see

a contract which states that the model has to

have a certain level of accuracy, the BIM is inher-

ently awed you cannot extract quantities of

concrete because the model has strayed from the

deliverables of the drawings. The two-dimensional

drawings are currently a contractual obligation and

therefore your model is handed over with massive

disclaimers saying For information purposes only,

do not scale, refer to drawings.

JW: On one project weve been asked to do the

O&Ms for both including an as-built BIM model, so

if it changes on-site, the model is adjusted to suit.

Sr: The CIC protocol which would be added to

a designers appointment or to a contractors

contract, creates the BIM models as deliverables

and they needed to be complete to the level of

detail required.

PW: The as required is the grey area, isnt it?

Sr: But in the same way that working outside of

BIM its a grey area. From that situation where you

would have the model straying from what the GAs

are showing, youre now seeing the model starting

to become the primary deliverable.

CDr: I would not want a section of the oor slab

junction being different to the model. If it was the

likes of 50, 25 mm Id go and change it, Id have

my model set up so that it reected that change on

one oor, or on 50 oors.

PW: The problem in receiving that model is, do

you make the assumption that you have that moral

regard for your deliverable or not.

CDr: Thats when you learn who to work with andwho not to work with!

LB: Weve got great examples on our project

where things have been modelled, like service rafts

on a typical oorplate, modelled in detail. With the

2D versions its not quite what youd like.

PW: The issue is that there is inherently a large

portion of the design that never goes past the

schematic. And in that respect it becomes an

aesthetic to produce a tap, because were not

actually going to model the connections that tie

that to the services, were talking purely in terms of

how pretty it looks and thats the reason why were

putting that into the model, rather than knowing

exactly how much pipe well need.

Does BIM go to that extent where we do

model everything, does that then mean that the

process of adopting BIM

becomes a hindrance

to the saving, to the

efciency of that design?

Do we take it too far?

Sr: Everything needs a tag,

you tag every socket outlet,

every tap, every valve, every

shutter point: those need

to be in the BIM but maybe

you dont need the thingsjoining them together.

PW: We know that light switch is attached to that

light, we dont need a physical cable to do so.

C: What are the product manufacturers

experiences in this area?

FW: The biggest interface we have is with M&E.

Plumbing, changes due to Building Regulations,

large holes going through the oor etc. Its all possi-

ble but it has to be designed at the right point, so if

you know it in advance, you could work out exactly

how much cable you would need, and say as a

builder to an electrician, if its any longer then youre

wasting my money and youre wasting materials.

Sr: A report was produced by CIC and BIS

earlier in the year which looked at the residential

sector, and said that it needed to be industri-

alised to get the volume thats needed, but we

all know why the industry keeps not doing that

and keeps producing fairly simple products. In

many ways thats what the Digital Plan of Work is

moving towards.

PW: Casey, as an architect what do you think about,

effectively, nancial people designing buildings?

CDr: Well, QS dont have curved rulers do they!

It happens to some extent already, but it shouldnt

hinder the design process. If youre getting cost

advice, it needs to be weighed up in terms of

benets for the project against what the client

would like as a building.

Sr: What I described there had nothing to do with

cost, it was to do with how you actually build things

out of components, how do you start to bring

things down to their essence in many ways thats

what good design is.

PW: I was playing devils advocate then for a reason,

because one of the other problems weve got as

an industry is that if you even discuss that sort

of approach, certainly in the academic circles of

architecture, then you get an awful lot of pushback.

In one university which I wont name, theyve got 56

lecturers teaching BIM and Revit, through all sortsof professional disciplines. The one department that

doesnt want anything to do with BIM is architecture,

because to them, it interferes with the fundamental

art of what they do.

The Culture Change

C: What does the culture change mean in

practice? Is it that CAD guys are suddenly the most

important in the ofce, or is it more than that; might

BIM bring architects back into the mainstream?

CDr: We are trying I have had chats with [RIBA

president] Angela Brady and weve been talking to

professional bodies, but its difcult to get people

on board and get them to understand what the

industrys doing because most of the people of

inuence are disconnected from the current way of

doing things.

PT: Theres a need for

a cultural shift in all

aspects of our industry

what are the cultural

barriers for product

manufacturers?

DG: Extremely

difcult cultural barri-

ers from time to time

in senior management tounderstand the implications for the business; same

difculties conveying it to them as to clients. Clients

who want BIM, but dont know what BIM is, but

they want it, they dont know why but they wonder

if they can make some money out of it.

PW: James mentioned at the beginning the gure

of 30K for a product manufacturer to adopt BIM,

but that doesnt help because I think for a SME

manufacturer, all they need to do is to understand

BIM and they need to be able to have a discussion

about it because for me, BIM can be summed up

in the word communication. And, in a lot of these

cases when we talk about level of detail, we talk

about the data drops, we talk about the interoper-

ability languages and the rest of it its all about

agreeing a communication strategy.

I would rather see a manufacturer do nothing

other than fully understand what BIM is and how

There is a lot of data we

use at concept stage

that is irrelevant at

FM pointCasey D Rutland,

Arup Associates


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C: Peter, what can you pinpoint savings-wise

so far on projects?

PT: Its difcult to pinpoint accurate savings on

a particular project, but we have a supply chain

partner providing steel framing systems, saved us

three weeks on a programme, and that equates to

money. Looking at BIM as a construction technique,

top down, bottom, up, simulating, evaluating,

optimising, saved us 10m on a project. I think

weve really yet to tap into the savings that can

come from the optimisation of the product data.

C: What would that entail, to be measurable?

PT: Having an electronic as-built asset, including

everything. We want to be able to give the client

their information, without costing them anything a

proactive O&M manual. Weve got one or two of

our supply chain partners working closely with us,

helping to develop that, BIM-Lite touch. Sometimes

that long-term management of the building will be us.

But its also around knowing what you have,

from a product data point of view. Once we make

that transfer from a generic specication to a

manufacturer, its very handy to know that across a

suite of hospitals, for example, a Procure 21 client

will want us to share best practice, share the learn-

ing on where weve got more efcient theyll be

rolling out the benets for everybody.

CDr: From very very early on, just from using the

authoring software, working in an environment

where the same planned sections, elevations and

3D views are all coming from one model seems

such common sense, but it still isnt done in many

architectural and design practices. People are really

saying BIMs not for us, its just for big practices,

well Im sorry, but if you had one person using that

software creating all those plans on one project, the

other three can work on other projects. So, from

that simple point of view, theres got to be a design

benet for everyone using the software in that

environment yes there is a delay, yes there is a

cost to train these people and buying the software,

but realistically if they were using two dimensional

software theyd still have to invest in hardware and

software to get to that point and train new people,

and I think its not really that much of a leap to train

them on BIM software.

Talking about the savings on site, its the small

things, one of the low-hanging fruits Simonmentioned was clash detection, and I do hate it

when people talk about BIM as being all about

clash detection and it being one of the massive

benets, because its just common sense, its

design coordination thats not a massive benet.

But at the same time whats actually happened is

youve prevented someone from having to tempo-

rarily prop something and come and cut a massive

hole in a chunk of steel, so youve got health and

safety benets, youve got cost benets, youve

got programme benets, all by saying lets reroute

through there. Its a common-sense thing that

youve not really accounted for, and things like that

are really measurable. Ultimately you will end up

saving time and resources, therefore money.

C: What about the product sector?

Sr: Its about how do you organise your compo-

nents with the least waste. Its not about pods, its

about bringing assemblies together. Thats what

the industry should be like, but so often its not, its

about bodging stuff on site, the more we get away

from that, thats where the savings will be delivered.

PW: One of the problems of articulating ROI for BIM

has always been that it removes a lot of the error, and

nobody ever wants to admit what it costs to make

those errors and what sort of money is wasted.

C: It also removes risk monies if somethings

not clear, you have risk, but if youve got clarity...

C: Will transparency in BIM help to avoid

switching a specication for an inferior alternative?

DG:The idea of using a BIM object because its

the only one available, and then essentially making

it equal or approved, I guess that suggests that

in a lot of cases it still will be interchangeable;

there wont necessarily be a huge advantage for

manufacturers. Also Casey, I know you use a lot

of your own models, as opposed to manufacturer

models, and theres an interchangeability after-wards. The thing I take from today that is a little bit

concerning is that it does appear to be quite simple

to switch things out within reason.

CDr:Yes, transparency makes things better, it will

highlight where things have been switched out,

hopefully, but until we get to a point where each

comparable object is comparable on a level basis

for the same parameters, on the same units, the

same scale, we cant really make a quick, simple,

fair judgement. The reason why I use a lot of my

own components within our own library is because

I know they work for the purposes we need to use

them for. We can use fairly generic components.

PT: Were all in the commercial world, and the

clients looking for efciencies, cost optimisation,

building optimisation. Its a complex thing when

we select our supply chain partners health and

safetys important, sustainability is important, reduc-

ing waste is important, getting guarantees, warran-

ties, longevity, all of that is important, as well as

the right price. Weve said to our supply chain, and

those that want to work with us, that if youre not

BIM-literate, were not excluding you from the party

right now, but in a years time, all other things being

equal, those that are, will have the advantage.

Visit buildingproducts.co.uk to download a PDF

version of this document.

Weve listed 60 benefits of BIM

internally, to us and clients, but

its a pity that half of our

clients arent interestedPeter Trebilcock,

Balfour Beatty

WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK THE ROUND TABLE SPONSORS FOR MAKING THIS EVENT POSSIBLE

Photos:DavidBerman

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