I currently use Sketchup / vray for marketing purposes (brochure images), however I’m also separately involved with utilising various basic tech for collating information for BIM. That being said, we are still going back to using Excel to accumulate all this information, as it’s still the common ground with our clients. The visual aspects of floorplans etc are done in separate software’s.
As @Julian_Smith has mentioned, Bi-Directional information is key when looking at BIM software.
In the UK we had a big fire often known as ‘Grenfell Tower Fire’, which has generated a lot of debate (and action) in relation to the quality of buildings and the management of them. Buildings have many aspects to them which need checking (fire doors / fire stopping / security in general) and engineers need to be on the ground checking these frequently (weekly / monthly / yearly).
Getting that information from the engineers to then update the central log seems to be the tricky part (Bi-Directional).
Just so that I can understand what other people have looked into, what software’s have people looked into?
I have somewhat in detail looked into:
- Viewpoint - Quite established but still quite pricey.
- Autodesk Build - Fairly new to the game, ant not usable for what we require, but has potential.
- novade - Quite similar to viewpoint.
My personal main areas of issue with BIM are:
- Simple tech engineers can use to update the central BIM files
- Clients not waiting to adopt new tech (as mentioned, it’s a sector that’s behind in the tech world)
- Everyone probably going to use different system, therefore people will probably end up using the ‘microsoft’ of the sector e.g. Revit
- Small companies not having the man hours to train on Revit or the likes of
The above problems, I believe, often result in excel just being used as the backup plan and the common ground for everyone. Each company then having their own system to work within internally, and then shared via excel.