Christopher Gibson-B2 Chapter 6: BIM for Contractors

In BIM : For Contractors, chapter 6 explains how the use of building information modeling (BIM) technology can be used by the contractors to optimize projects by saving time and money. The main areas that the can be aided by using this are constructability analysis/clash detection between trades when assembling all parts in a project, quantity takeoffs/cost estimating to save money and time on the amount of material being used and how it can be transported, integration of cost/schedule with managements functions, offsite fabrication, and lastly the ending handover/commissioning. Although, the switch from hard copy drawings to 4D building information model can be difficult to learn, the benefits greatly outnumber the downfalls for the most efficiently built project.  

For my second co-op, I worked for a construction management company named Structure Tone which utilized BIM technology for all projects. I noticed some advantages that I had by using BIM which saved the owner (Prudential Insurance) lots of time and money. One major benefit was the reduction of design errors using clash detection, by using the up-to-date drawings and 3-D modeling of the projects utilities lines mapped out the engineers and contractors could see upcoming problems before they were actually encountered in the field.  During our weekly meetings we would display models and drawings for the upcoming week(s) like in Figure 1 below and highlight any difficult parts of the project that could have many trades working in the same general area to avoid clashing or trades waiting to get their work done by another trade.  

Figure 1: Depicts snapshot of contractors using BIM to support MEP coordination.

Response 1: Marino da Costa

I enjoyed reading your post about BIM for Owners and Facility Managers because this is a type of BIM point of view that I personally have never had before and it intrigues me how others are looking at the same model but for a completely different reason. The owner has to always be thinking about the big picture and not too worried about day-today problems.

Response 2: Sarah Hollis

I appreciate your emphasis on entire timeline of BIM and how it has changed over time. I also agree with the major issue you discussed of errors of measurements due several things in the field like weather and infield measurements that change due to building codes.

Response 3:  Lucy Tangari

I really liked how you touched on some new aspects with BIM design that I did not know you could use to aid a project. For example, the energy consumption efficiency being optimized and energy payoff. This in turn made me also read your chapter of the BIM textbook.