Thanks to everyone who participated in our webinar announcing the release of Wall Reinforcement, our newest BIM Solution for Revit.

If you haven't yet seen the full webinar or want to see it again, head over to our YouTube channel to watch it. While there, please subscribe to our channel!

Today, we take up the third topic in our #AU2019 series: Digital Asset Inventories & BIM for Facility Management.

Taking a digital inventory of facilities — from factories, hospitals, and schools to shopping malls and industrial plants — is becoming increasingly popular because it makes managing them easier and more effective. This is especially true for buildings that were constructed without digital documentation because, when they are handed over to new owners or managers, a daunting lack of information often comes with them. Information that is available is more often than not in the form of paper documents, be those drawings, technical specs, or project and product certificates. Those in turn may be outdated, deteriorated, and can turn up missing over the years. This all means that a large portion of facility information is either inaccessible from the get-go or is subject to expiration or decay.

Digitizing buildings using accurately processed data obtained from 3D laser scanning not only solves these problems but brings a host of benefits besides. Check out the attached white paper wherein we lay out the 6 stages comprising the digital inventory process and the benefits to be accrued.

Digital Inventory of Existing Assets

Prepared by Bryan Bradley of Textus Aptus

This Canadian engineering and design firm says AGACAD’s software for modelling precast concrete elements in Revit^® has halved the time it spends on drawings and improved its overall efficiency while enhancing project quality.

Client Profile

Kerkhoff Engineering Ltd is a structural engineering and design firm with commercial, residential and agricultural projects across Western Canada. One of the company's areas of expertise is precast concrete. Whether working on offices, homes, warehouses, airport terminals or dairy farms, the team's focus is on using its experience and the latest technologies to deliver cost-effective innovative solutions that fully satisfy each client.

In the lead-up to Autodesk University 2019, at which we'll be an exhibitor, we're honing in on three areas of focus: Classification, Fabrication, and Transformation.

Last week we looked at BIM Content Management & Classification.
This week it's BIM for Prefabricated Construction.

Prefabricated construction brings several advantages, as our own Aleksandras Seza recently outlined. What it boils down to is, if building components can be prefabricated, construction time drops and quality assurance shoots up. That's why AGACAD has spent years developing and honing cutting-edge software for Revit that meets the demand for efficiently turning architectural drawings into BIM models, be they framed timber or steel panels or precast concrete structures, which can then be prefabricated, allowing for quick manufacture on site.

Here's a closer look at the solutions we bring to the table, what clients have to say about them, and our dedicated BIM Application engineers (all of whom are Certified Revit Professionals) and whom you can meet at our booth (AE452) at AU2019.

A few months ago we released a couple of Dynamo scripts for reinforcing precast walls in Revit. Since those churned up a lot of interest, we decided to go forward with creating a Wall Reinforcement add-on.

Wall Reinforcement lets you efficiently distribute wall reinforcement for solid, double, and sandwich walls based on defined rules. It recognizes the shape of the wall and distributes the main reinforcement and additional reinforcement for the wall perimeter and openings.

Here's the basic workflow to follow when using Wall Reinforcement.

Structuring data – classifying it – is key to unlocking the full value of BIM. It’s about clearly communicating design intent in order to more accurately budget, plan and build an asset (and then more efficiently manage it over its lifetime). Without classification, data is easily misunderstood and sometimes just not usable. Well-classified data has increasing value.

In the past the classification of building information was both less important and more difficult. It cost a lot of time and effort but often yielded little value. That has changed. Classification is becoming ever more important. More valuable. And easier.

Projects today generate more data. And AEC increasingly relies on that data to automate processes, make better decisions and operate devices. Look at all the add-ons for Revit and other platforms, the CNC machines, robots and VR/AR devices. The Internet of Things.

Moreover, the teams that undertake building projects are becoming more complex. Architects and engineers are creating models for use by cost estimators, consultants, contractors, fabricators and so on in multiple other organizations and countries.

In each case, all the actors – people, software, equipment – need a common language, an agreed-upon data structure. It could be international standards. Or national classification systems. Or custom ones. That depends on the project. But if BIM managers don’t decide on classifications and model creators don’t implement them, everyone suffers. In fact today many projects do suffer from mistakes and delays due to a lack of classification. Instead of a valuable “common data environment” they have a costly “chaotic data environment”.

We’re talking about effective data exchange. Harmonization. Interoperability.

So what’s the value created by classifying BIM data?

• Clarity: Project participants can quickly find and understand the data they need
• Integration: Systems, machines, devices can automatically access and process data
• Efficiency: Owners can aggregate costs, other data in multi-asset management tools
• Competition: Public and private procurement become more open and transparent

In terms of the falling costs of classifying data, classification management tools are now emerging that really do simplify life.

We are pleased to announce that we will be exhibiting with our partner Omnix International at the International Concrete Conference & Exhibition (ICCX) in Sharjah, UAE this November 24-25.

As the only trade fair in the Middle East focused exclusively on concrete technology and manufacture, ICCX has quickly established itself as an important meeting point for concrete and precast industry experts.

Omnix has been our exclusive software distributor in the Middle East since March 2014, so we are stoked to be sharing a booth together at the third annual ICCX–Middle East. If you will be there, come visit us at booth 2!

If you're involved in the design and fabrication of precast concrete and you'll be at the conference, our structural engineer Valensas would like to meet you. He'd be happy to show how to streamline your process with our Precast Concrete BIM Solution for Revit, answer any questions you may have about it, and of course he'd like to hear from you about what your needs are because that's how we continually drive our software forward, with feedback from experts out in the industry.

Great news for current users of Precast Concrete for Revit 2020/2019: Wall Reinforcement is included in your license of Precast Concrete, gratis!

Users of Precast Concrete 2020, you should have received an email with instructions for how to get Wall Reinforcement to show up in your Precast license.

Users of Precast Concrete 2019, please follow the steps below.

1. Click Support at upper-right in the TOOLS4BIM Dock.
2. Copy your activation key.
3. Paste your key in the activation field.

Thanks to everyone who participated in our webinar last month that gave a basic overview of the workflow for using our Precast Concrete BIM Solution to design precast structures in Revit.

If you haven't yet seen the full webinar or want to see it again, head over to our YouTube channel to watch it. While there, please subscribe to our channel!

Thanks to everyone who participated in our webinar last month about the 12 add-ons in our Tools4Revit Suite. It was one of the biggest turnouts we've ever had! All seats were taken, so some of you who registered were unable to view the live webinar.

If you haven't yet seen the full webinar or want to see it again, head over to our YouTube channel to watch it. While there, please subscribe to our channel!

By the way, while you're watching it, use the timestamps in the video description to skip to the segments of interest to you. Here's how:

1. Go to the webinar: 12 Revit tools for everyday carry