Three new enhancements to the BIM Toolkit

The latest update to the free-to-use BIM Toolkit has some nice new enhancements included.

Since the launch of the BIM Toolkit in April 2015 we have been steadily adding improvements in response to feedback from those working on live projects. This work to date has included the ability to search and filter the data, the ability to provide access to other members of the project team, the delivery of an API to access the library data and also a full set of classification tables.

However, the most recent enhancements include:

1. Help your clients at strategy and brief stage
At the start of the project, prior to the team being assembled, the client may work with a consultant to put together a digital plan of work.

At this stage of a project, the specific deliverables will probably not be known. For example, it will be known that the architect will be responsible for the design of the doors. But it will not yet be known whether there will be sliding, automatic or folding doors. Equally, it will be known that the maintenance information for the heat emitters will be required at handover - but will not be known whether air curtains, fan convectors or radiators will be specified.

In this new update, the consultant may work with the client to add items at the third level of the classification structure into the plan of work, assign them to the likely discipline and add a brief note against each item.

As an example, the screenshot below shows that structural framing systems have been assigned to the Structural Engineer and a briefing note has been added based on the client's similar previous projects. Note that at this stage a firm decision has not been made as to what type of framing system (whether steel, concrete, timber etc...)

Defining responsibilities prior to the design stages starting

For those working to BIM Level-2, this information can be exported to form part of the Employer's Information Requirements and then the BIM Execution Plan.

As the project develops and the concepts have been agreed the design team that has been appointed will then make these decisions. The screenshot below shows that the structural engineer has now selected the specific systems using the new 'system picker'.

Also shown in the screenshot is an indicator to the project team on how many decisions are remaining. The initial digital plan of work acts as a checklist for the design and specification decisions at Stage 3 of a project.

Selecting the systems to be designed and specified.

For those project team members using NBS Create, the data from this digital plan of work can then be used to generate a specification that is ready to be prepared. This can be achieved by selecting each of the specific systems and then clicking the 'Generate Specification' button.

Although the above example looks at design, this BIM Toolkit 'picker' functionality also works for the handover stage too. An example would be where the heat emitter deliverable is replaced by air curtains and fan convectors once this is known.

2. Start a job with template deliverables
The previously described ability to bridge the information flow gap between strategy/brief and design was the number one request. However, shortly following this was the feedback that it would be really useful to have an '80/20' list of the likely deliverables on a project.

The basic RIBA Plan of Work template project now contains around 160 systems for a 'typical' building. It is hoped that this helps users get started and aids the initial conversation between the consultant and the client when considering information requirements. If at the start of a project it is known that no excavating and filling is needed - this item can be deleted. Equally, if a more unusual item such as straw bale walling is to be used, then this can be added to the list using the 'Add deliverable' button.

80/20 inclusion of systems in a typical building

Thanks must go to our NBS Advisory Panel who helped put this list together over the last few months based on their experience on recent projects.

3. See a case study of a real project
The third main enhancement is the ability to quickly open up and glance through a real life project. The screenshot below shows that the user can select a case study example from the new project wizard.

Select a case study

At the time of writing this blog, there is a case study for a school project. Hopefully over the coming months we'll get a few more case studies in from different sectors. Example content from this case study can be seen below. It should be noted that example briefing notes can be seen against each deliverable that are relevant to a school project.

Example school project.

Many thanks to Alistair from Manchester City Council and Mark S from PCSG for their support with this case study :)

So, it's great to see the BIM Toolkit continuing the improve in response to customer needs. The whole web application is completely free to use and this includes (a) the level of definition guides, (b) the classification tables and (c) the digital plan of work functionality. We hope you are finding it a great resource whether you are working to BIM Level 2 - or whether you simply just want a well-structured design responsibility matrix and schedule of services.

Please check out:
- A three minute video introduction to the BIM Toolkit
- A detailed introduction to the BIM Toolkit
- Case study - The BIM Toolkit being used on a Secondary School project

Also, a free webinar will take place at 11.15am on Friday 7th October 2016 where my colleague Sarah Grey will be demonstrating these recent enhancements and answering questions. To book your place - please see the webpage below:
- https://www.thenbs.com/knowledge/bim-toolkit-continues-to-support-level-2-bim-ambitions

Construction News Awards 2016 - BIM Excellence

Interserve Construction won the BIM Excellence award at yesterday evening's CN Awards.

Interserve win

Speaking to one of the judges at the event yesterday, they were heavily praised for the way they have adopted BIM through their organisation and the support structure they have put in place. An overview of their entry is below...

The notes from the winners booklet

At NBS, we were very pleased to be shortlisted - having our name side by side with the likes of Interserve, BDP, Carillion, GBE, Mouchel, SES and Skanska is an achievement in itself.

Some more photographs from the night and a little bit more on our entry below...

The NBS Table 

Kevin Bridges was an excellent host - pictured with NBS imagery as his back drop

The shortlist of eight

In terms of the NBS entry, I include some slides below from the pitch that myself and Stefan delivered a few months back...

Helping define BIM Level-2

Collaborating across industry to produce the free-to-use BIM Toolkit

A tool that clearly defines who will do what and when following the PAS1192 process

A focus on information requirements

How the wider NBS BIM ecosystem allows design, specification and library information to come together

The powerful connections between the NBS premium offerings

Not just BIM success on an exemplar project - but helping professionals succeed with BIM around the world

But unfortunately, not successful this year... maybe next year?

CN Awards 2016

More on NBS and BIM below...

- https://www.thenbs.com/services/bim-projects

ThinkBIM - Summer Conference 2016

Yesterday I chaired the ThinkBIM Summer Conference - Soft data, hard landings and asset management.

The theme was looking at stages 7, 0 and 1 of a project. How the needs of the 'in use' stage of a project could be considered at the 'strategy' and 'briefing' stage.

The venue for the ThinkBIM conferences is now the fantastic Squire Paton Boggs offices in Leeds City Centre. The photograph below shows the lovely new setting that mixes the old with the new in terms of architecture...

A new setting for ThinkBIM

Deborah Rowland was the first speaker. Deborah has experience in facility management in the private sector for Barclays and also as one of the leaders in the public sector through her work with Ministry of Justice.

To find out more about the MoJ story please see the link below:
- https://prezi.com/b73gw4x6duec/moj-bim-story-bim-prospects-2016/

Deborah also talked highly of the work being done by Andy Green from Faithful+Gould on linking SFG20 maintenance specifications with NRM and Uniclass 2015 codes to help with data flow from design and construction into operations.
- https://www.fgould.com/uk-europe/articles/new-customisable-sfg20-changing-world-building/

Jacqueline Walpole then followed with her keynote. Jacqueline reflected back on the work she was involved in a few years ago with UCL Academy, BAM and Autodesk looking at FM and BIM solutions.
- http://www.bam.co.uk/how-we-do-it/case-study/ucl-academy

It was interesting listening to Jacqueline's expertise and seeing how digitised the FM industry already is. The challenge, as always, is to try and get digital information to flow and not to have to start from scratch at certain phases of the project.

A to-scale version of the plan of work that nicely illustrates the importance of the 'in use' phase

Following the opening two keynotes, it was time for the roundtables. For this event, I hosted a session looking at how lessons learned from the operation stages of previous projects can feed into an EIR template for future projects.

A digital technical structure to supplement the EIR process

ThinkBIM Duncan asked for five take-home points from the roundtable. So here we go...

1. A few years on now since the publication of PAS1192:2 and 3 the participants are still not seeing many good examples of EIRs on projects. This includes projects where teams are working for extremely large clients who do many repeat similar buildings. The sample content on the BIM Task Group website and the documents made public from MofJ seem to be the best examples currently:
   - BIM Task Group sample EIR
   - MoJ sample documents
   
2. Lessons learned on successes and failures can feed into the EIRs. A specific example given was repeated mistakes on wall covering solutions on multiple retail projects for the same client from different teams  - could be easily avoidable if this information was captured digitally and fed into a single template.
   
3. Big clients could make big savings by employing one person to standardised their processes and concentrate on good data kicking off a project. If you are building 12 offices/superstore/schools per year - could you save at least £5K per project by employing someone to get the digital process right?
   
4. A solution that allowed information to flow digitally from strategy to brief into the information production phases of a project would be well received. I presented some concepts as to how this could maybe be done through a template plan of work that considered space types and system types and it was well received. For example, a high school will have an assembly hall and washrooms and piling systems and heating systems etc... - having lessons learned captured in a template which then fed into design to ensure a better outcome when the school is used is something that would provide value.
   
5. Could the various sector specific BIM4 groups contribute to sample templates that help their sectors? Sharing knowledge and making the industry more efficient? Many of the BIM groups have been receiving information from the central BIM Task Group over the last five years - is it now time for everyone to show how it can be done?

The final session was from Dr Graham Kelly from BIM Academy. He presented the work they have been doing in Australia with the Sydney Opera House.

This was a fascinating case study - plenty of web links below on how they are connecting many databases via an online 3D model viewer to meet the building's daily FM needs.
- http://www.bimplus.co.uk/news/aecom-and-b1im-acade4my-t5eam-create-bimfm-/
- http://www.i2c.com.au/2016/05/sydney-opera-house-bim-implementation-video/

Graham from BIM Academy - using the 3D model, via a webbrowser for the FM of a major building

So all in all - another super ThinkBIM conference. Well done to all of the team that put it together and I look forward to the next one.

To view all of my posts from the ThinkBIM series over the last five years or so click below:
- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/thinkBIM

An introduction to NBS BIM Toolkit - Video

As part of the development of our new website we wanted to produce a set of videos that introduce some of the NBS offerings in three minutes.

The first of these was the BIM Workflow video we released in March.

The second of these was the introduction to NBS Create we released in April.

A few weeks ago in May we released our third video. This one tells the story of the BIM Toolkit highlighting the key benefits of this tool to owner/operators, the design/construction team and also construction manufacturers.

Please watch it below - Some commentary to the story is also provided below the video in this blog post.

The story behind the video again is from the point of view of the current refurbishment work that is taking place on our building in Newcastle (project led by JDDK architects).

The key objectives of BIM Level-2

The standards and tools that define BIM Level 2

Helping clients define who is doing what and when to meet their information requirements

Define information requirements and responsibilities and export to help create EIRs and BEPs

A tool for project teams to collaborate online when producing information in response to the EIR/BEP

A huge library of free-to-use classifications and LOD/LOI guidance illustrations across all sectors

Quickly reference these LOD/LOI items from an online digital plan of work

Helping manufacturers on their BIM Level-2 journey and placing their products in front of the decision makers on major projects

Populate your product data sheets using templates as a 'step one' on a BIM journey 

Support in placing this well structured data into parametric 3D objects that will be used by the largest of architectural and engineering practices

Find out more on all of the technical concepts at toolkit.thenbs.com/articles

A big thank you once again to our video partner Soluis - top video again - big thanks in particular to Laura for her work over the last few months.

To explore and start using BIM Toolkit please visit - https://toolkit.thenbs.com

Please keep an eye out on this blog and theNBS.com for some pretty nice BIM Toolkit enhancements coming soon too! They've been pretty well received during recent customer visits - so looking forward to them going live.

To watch the video, please check it out on our website below...
- thenbs.com/services/our-tools/nbs-bim-toolkit

How NBS fits into your BIM workflow - Video

As part of the launch of our new brand and our new website - we now have a dedicated place on our website explaining how NBS products and services can support you within your BIM workflow.

As part of this, we have just produced a three minute video as a short introduction.

- theNBS.com/BIMWorkflow

What I think is particularly nice about this video is that the story is told from our own building project that is currently under way. This is a genuine model of our building. The content and software examples are genuine. Some stills from the video are explained below.

At an early stage, client information requirements can be defined in the NBS BIM Toolkit

Generic objects from the National BIM Library can help generate concept designs

Specifications can be started early and then developed through the timeline using NBS Create

Relevant standards and regulations are linked to BIM objects and specifications within the Construction Information Service

Product specifications from over 650 manufacturers may be added using NBS Plus

The NBS Plug-in for Autodesk Revit synchronises the model and the specification

Information is developed through the project timeline

The connectivity between the solutions is what makes them so effective

To find out more about our BIM solutions - please see:
- theNBS.com/BIMWorkflow

Thanks to chartered architects JDDK who have led the building project

Thanks also (again) to Soluis who partnered with us to produce our third engaging BIM video (previous 1, previous 2).
- Soluis.com

Using NBS on BIM projects - Case studies

At a recent NBS BIM event in Birmingham we asked a number of organisations that have adopted BIM to talk about their experiences.

It was fantastic to see the odd slide that showed NBS being used on these projects.

I did a write up for our RIBA Insight website below:
- http://www.riba-insight.com/monthlyBriefing/16-02/bim-case-studies-from-architects-and-manufacturers.asp

Some screenshots from this article below:

Associated Architects using the BIM Toolkit LOD guidance on a project

Associated Architects using the National BIM Library content linked to an NBS specification on a project

James and Ward Ltd making the point that manufacturers should be making BIM objects available

Assa Abloy presenting how they have worked with NBS to deliver against their BIM strategy

It's great to see screen grabs of our content and tools being used on BIM projects. If anyone out there wants to send any in for inclusion in a blog post please get in touch.

Read the full article
- http://www.riba-insight.com/monthlyBriefing/16-02/bim-case-studies-from-architects-and-manufacturers.asp

Top five blog posts of 2015

First of all a very merry Christmas to anyone who has visited my blog this year. I hope everyone has a great Christmas break and returns ready to go again in 2016.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all who visit this blog!

I've now been blogging about BIM, technology and all things NBS for over six year - time flies! At the end of each year I look at the web stats to see which of my posts attracted the most web traffic. Now looking back at 2015, in reverse order the top five were...

In 5th place - BIM Management Handbook

- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/the-bim-management-handbook.html

In 5th place was a review I wrote looking at the big RIBA Publishing BIM title of the year, David Shepherd's 'BIM Management Handbook'.

It should be noted that my review of BIM for Dummies (Mordue, Swaddle and Philp) was posted slightly later in the year so just missed out on this 5th place spot. But as books are best purchased in pairs you may also want to check that excellent publication out too...
- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/building-information-modelling-for.html


In 4th place - The NBS BIM Object Standard

- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/nbs-bim-object-standard-and-shared.html

In February a social media/blogging debate started asking the question whether standards were needed in terms of BIM object creation.

After observing opinion, I put my two pennies worth in arguing that by standardising terminology and promoting international, and national standards, then a greater quality of BIM object is created. We have consistent data on sites like rightmove and autotrader and this allows us to make more informed decisions - so why not for BIM?

The debate started again in September. Below is a follow up post:
- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/standardised-bim-objects-for-uk.html


In 3rd place - Ecobuild 2015 Review

- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/ecobuild-2015-bim-what-you-missed.html

In March we were fortunate enough to be chosen by UBM to curate the content for their BIM Theatre at Ecobuild. I think we put on a decent show with well over 100 delegates at each presentation.

The blog post looked back at the three days in East London at one of the construction industry's biggest annual events.

Note - watch this space for news about Ecobuild 2016!


In 2nd place - Updates to the NBS Plug-in for Autodesk Revit

- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/enhancements-to-nbs-plug-in-for.html
Moving from a document-way-of-working to a digital-way-of-working  has seen real efficiency and accuracy improvements where tools and content work together. The success of our NBS plug-in for Autodesk Revit demonstrates this.

The second most popular post of the year looked at the 2016 enhancements to our plug-in. Link to the specification, view NBS design guidance, check annotations, drag and drop objects into the model, synchronised guidance about the objects... As a free tool it really helps put the information into building information modelling.

Also check out, the recent post below looking at the personalisation enhancements with newly introduced 'My Library'.
- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/your-nbs-national-bim-library.html


In 1st place - The BIM Toolkit in ten minutes

- http://constructioncode.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/the-bim-toolkit-in-ten-minutes.html
There was also the small matter of the release of the Innovate UK funded BIM Toolkit that was developed as a free-to-use tool for those working to UK Government Level-2 BIM.

NBS led the team that worked through a six-month funding period (and beyond) to develop this. The Toolkit in ten minutes blog post gave an overview to all of the key concepts and gave pointers on where to find out more on all of these in terms of technical articles.

So whether you are an client wanting to know more about employer's information requirements, or a design manager wanting to know about LOD or a manufacturer wanting to structure your digital product information - the BIM Toolkit is a great free resource for industry.

So that's it for another year - back in 2016!