BIM in 5D

[Vipul13]

Hello! I hope you all are doing fine. Please allow me to introduce myself;

I am currently studying for my master's degree in Construction and Real Estate Management at Metropolia University of Applied Science, Helsinki. I have worked as a Senior Engineer for 35months in L&T Construction in New Delhi, India. As an engineer, I realized that most of the activities at my site were unplanned. Hindrances include delay in decisions, rework due to quality issues, waiting for approval of vendors and suppliers, approval of drawings from the consultant and most importantly, clash of resources within the teams. These resulted in work stress, cost overrun and failure to achieve planned targets.

I have not been exposed to BIM during my past work experience. Through BIM, I am interested in developing effective means to minimize delays, non-value adding activities, risks, and cost overruns, ultimately increasing the productivity of a construction project.

I have read a few papers on BIM in 5D, but mostly they are case studies on the problems a company faces during the implementation. Could you please give me some leads on how I can proceed ahead?

Thank you!

 

[3DDave]

Most of what you mention seem likely to fall under ordinary project management. Having good and reputable suppliers is more important to avoiding all the things you mention than evaluating building design. No matter what you plan for the building if you have bad suppliers you will get bad results.

 

[Vipul13]

Thanks for the reply, @3DDave!

I agree that having a good supplier is very important for a project. However, as per my knowledge, that is not sufficient to deliver a construction project on time, within the cost package and with optimised resource allocation. If having a good supplier would have been enough, what was the need of introducing BIM in 4D,5D,6D and 7D? I believe that with the help of BIM, we can tackle all these issues more efficiently.
I would love to hear your opinion on this.

 

[3DDave]

Every problem you listed was for a problem involving people, most involving suppliers. Only if you get enough good ones you can make better decisions.

rework due to quality issues
approval of drawings
waiting for approval of vendors and suppliers
delay in decisions
non-value adding activities
cost overruns

BIM fixes problems that aren't on your list. For example - while BIM can get a good estimate (based on bids from suppliers and the work they are supposed to do) it's the suppliers who overrun what they bid for the work, either because they underbid or due to delays, such as weather, strikes, materials price increases, and so forth. BIM cannot control those factors.