Collaboration par excellence

Example: Hasselt City Hall, Belgium — The building of the new municipal administration center in Hasselt, Belgium, demonstrates how seamless collaboration in building projects can minimize risks and save costs from the design phase all the way to commissioning.
A joint project of several brands of the Nemetschek Group.
Nemetschek brands involved: Allplan, GRAPHISOFT, Solibri

Pioneering planning and project execution with Open BIM

“The end-to-end use of BIM solutions constitutes genuine added value for all stakeholders in the building process
because it enables seamless and efficient collboration”
Steven Hendrickx, Head Architect in Hasselt

Large-scale, highly complex building projects in particular require ongoing, reliable and efficient coodination between all stakeholders – both internal and external – across disciplines and between companies. Therefore, in association with other market players, the Nemetschek Group is promoting the Open BIM data standard. This is a universal, collaborative approach to designing, constructing and operating buildings based on open standards and workflows It makes it possible for project stakeholders to collaborate, even if the type of software varies from user to user. The Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) interface has established itself as an open standard and is therefore of central significance.

Sharing and evaluating data throughout the entire product life cycle saves time and money and improves quality. The administration of data is key to this digital transformation, for it is only possible to take full advantage of the potential if each stakeholder can access the data that he or she needs at any given time. This begins with a realistic BIM building model, which is an essential prerequisite for a genuine 5D workflo. This model is no longer limited to just 3D construction data; it also includes data concerning the dimensions of time and costs.

Seamless collaboration exemplified by the Hasselt City Hall

Under the management of the architect team comprising Jaspers-Eyers, MASS Architects and Michel Janssen, a new municipal administration center is being built in Hasselt. The complex, consisting of a renovated building section and a new building, provides approx. 17,000 m2 for the city administration and social services as well as offices. The architects and their most important partners are using Open BIM software solutions for the entire construction process. Three Nemetschek solutions are being implemented for this project: Archicad from Graphisoft for the design and planning of the architects, Allplan Engineering for civil engineering, and the Solibri Model Checker for the BIM quality control carried out by the construction company.

From the beginning, all information concerning the building project is contained in the digital building model – from the draft to implementation – including all design details, desired materials, fire protection requirements, acoustic properties, insulation and building structures, and administration. This constitutes considerable added value for all stakeholders compared to the old standard model, which was purely 3D. Thus, this improvement ensures more than just seamless collaboration between all those involved. The complex project can be turned over to the municipality – the proud building owner – with the required quality, on time and within the specified budget.

Hasselt City Hall is groundbreaking – in terms of design, planning and project implementation.

Independent and yet consistent

Steven Hendrickx, the head architect in Hasselt, recognized four decisive factors with Open BIM over the course of the successful project:

  • Individual partners design their model with their preferred BIM software, and with their own templates. Outstanding collaboration is ensured, though, thanks to a common, uniform standard which is specified in advance.
  • The division of labor is defined at the beginning of the project. Data on statics, for instance, have an essential impact on the architecture and structural design. Data on heating, ventilation and air-conditioning, on the other hand, are also important but don’t generally flow directly into the architecture. These data, for example, can be sufficiently analyzed with the BIM solution for quality assurance from Solibri.
  • Design changes in one area don’t necessarily affect the plans of all the others involved in the project. The architecture and the building stage are inherently the most closely linked.
  • The expertise of the staff, i.e., extensive holistic knowledge of the various building disciplines, is also critical for the success of the project.

Two examples of the advantage of precise planning

In Hasselt, the construction company was commissioned with excavation, among other tasks. An assessment of the amount of sand that needed to be removed was done based on a cal culation using conventional 2D planning methods, which yielded a result of 800 cubic meters. The engineers used the Solibri Model Checker based on Open BIM and the data provided by the architects and arrived at a figue that was just half this amount, i.e., 400 cubic meters of sand. This shows how exact the work with Open BIM solutions can be.

The steel struts to be installed are another example: With the interface function IFC Exports from Allplan, it was possible to use the BIM model to automatically calculate which steel struts needed fieproofing. All it took was a mouse click to obtain precise results, right down to the running meter. In projects that don’t use Open BIM solutions, these calculations are made by manually entering the data from 2D drawings in Excel or some other software and then recalculating and evaluating the data for use in quotations and planning, a process that is susceptible to error and one that leaves a lot of room for interpretation. These errors often go undetected until the actual cost planning is already completed. In the case of the Hasselt City Hall,  it was possible to avoid such errors from the outset.

Converting to Open BIM pays off

As is the case with any change, it takes a certain amount of time for companies and employees to accept BIM as the norm. The best way, according to Steven Hendrickx, is to start out by planning smaller projects using BIM. The experience thereby gained will make it possible to complete successively larger BIM projects. The advantages of collaborating through Open BIM are obvious: The entire workflow is much simpler for all project stakeholders, and building projects are completed within time and cost budgets.

CONCLUSION

Consistent standards and open interfaces in par-ticular are essential for successful building projects. Stakeholders need solutions that can “work together” for all and any individual tasks being performed. Seamless collaboration between humans and machines: This is ensured with Open BIM, and backed by the brands of the Nemetschek Group.

Reference projects on this topic:

English Version of Vectorworks 2016 Design Software Hits the AEC, Landscape and Entertainment Markets

Vectorworks Brand News News Company News

More than 100 updates and new features support creative design processes, enabling professionals to seamlessly transform the world from concept to built reality.

Columbia, MD, September 16, 2015 – Global design software developer Vectorworks, Inc.®, formerly Nemetschek Vectorworks, Inc. announces the release of Vectorworks 2016, as well as its rebrand. The release includes more than 100 updates and features for its award-winning CAD and BIM design solutions, including Vectorworks® Designer, Architect, Landmark, Spotlight, Fundamentals and Renderworks®. From streamlined project sharing, graphical scripting and point cloud support, to subdivision modeling and a system that measures a design’s energy performance, users will be poised to generate, define, build and explore form and function through enhanced workflows and improved design processes.

“Designers know that the successful development of their best ideas requires flexibility and precision while leaving open the opportunity for discovery. That’s why Vectorworks 2016 software empowers creativity throughout the entire process – particularly in a BIM workflow,” said Sean Flaherty, CEO at Vectorworks. “Over our 30-year history, we’ve always looked to our users for feedback to improve our software. As we move forward under our new brand with the release of Vectorworks 2016, we will continue to turn to them, both as a company inspired by great design and as a creator of tools that work how designers think, enabling visionaries to explore, model and solve their next design challenge all in one software package.”

To fully support Vectorworks’ customer-centric philosophy, over 70 percent of the 2016 version’s updates and features were born from customer feedback, with the entire research and development efforts for the new release led by the company’s Chief Technology Officer Dr. Biplab Sarkar.

“Delivering accurate modeling information while remaining true to a designer’s vision is the pivotal point of any artistic enterprise,” said Sarkar. “Vectorworks 2016 software’s first-class tools and customizable workflows give you more resources than ever to design with confidence and precision, no matter your discipline, while supporting the creative process.”

Today’s announcement marks the beginning of Vectorworks 2016’s worldwide rollout, which continues with the release of localized versions in nine additional languages over the next several months. Some of the tools and features in this release include:

  • Project Sharing is an intuitive means for teams to communicate and collaborate while working concurrently on the same Vectorworks design file.
  • Subdivision Modeling allows designers to transform primitive shapes like spheres and cubes into any form imaginable.
  • Marionette is the first and only cross-platform, Python®-based graphical scripting tool in the AEC, landscape and entertainment industries. Designers can create visual scripts that take advantage of Vectorworks software’s 2D and 3D modeling capabilities, integrating seamlessly with BIM environments.
  • Energos offers a dynamic, intelligent gauge of a building’s energy performance during the design process and is based on the Passivhaus calculation method.
  • Point Cloud Support allows designers using their preferred 3D scanning device to capture a physical location and import a 3D point cloud object into Vectorworks software to manipulate and measure.’
  • Roof Components and Styles will interact with wall components ensure accuracy in the documentation of sections and elevations. Roof faces and roof objects now have the same component representation as walls and slabs, further extending the power of BIM.
  • Landmark Site Modifier and Hardscape Tool Improvements help landscape professionals and urban planners design more efficiently and be more creative with pavements and walkways, including sloping hardscapes.
  • Spotlight Improvements offer tools to design and document overhead stage rigging, create stages and quickly access symbols to explore any idea imaginable.
  • Several New Features and Improvements in our Renderworks module include an upgraded MAXON Cinema 4D® render engine, Caustic Capabilities with refraction of light through translucent surfaces, Ambient Occlusion that adds depth to designs with more realistic shadowing and the New Grass Shader, as well as new camera effects, such as depth of field, exposure, vignette and bloom, allow for more realistic and striking visualizations and animations.

The English-language version of Vectorworks 2016 software is available to Vectorworks Service Select customers today by download. Shipping of the English-language version to all other customers will begin on September 23, 2015. Visit vectorworks.net/2016 to learn more.

Press members can request interviews, a copy of the software or a demo by contacting Communications Specialist Lauren Burke at Lburke@vectorworks.net. Press may also learn more, as well as view videos and download high-resolution images, by visiting the press webpage here: vectorworks.net/2016/press.

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