Week-2 Discussions–Comments

Overall Comment

• This was a very successful week of discussions in which you interacted with your peers much more effectively and made a number of very worthwhile points.  Congratulations.
• Some posts were shorter than the desired 300 words.  If they were greater than 200 words I didn’t penalize this week, but will be more rigid in future.

2D-3D Transition

There are some good thoughts here on the practical reasons to stick with 2D.  For the sake of being sure that BIM capabilities are fully appreciated, I’d note that:

• 2D views in BIM can be fully active so that changes made there are reflected in the 3D view.
• One can reference views just as easily in BIM as in regular CAD files, with all references being automatically updated if something changes.

I’d also note that we didn’t have much explicit discussion of the issue of file-size and the impact that has on this kind of division.  This is an area where the approaches of different vendors (e.g. Autodesk vs. Bentley) can make a large difference.

Criteria for BIM Selection

This is an excellent set of thoughts about the relationship of BIM to the organization of a new firm.

My addition to the discussion would be that an additional criteria might be the suitability of the software to provide fabrication drawings, not just the bidding documents that most of the participants identified.

Implementation of Unified Parametric Model

There was general agreement on the difficulty of a unified model in the near term, and also on the desirability in future.

I’d comment that there are great opportunities for building construction and operation with such a unified model –not just during design.

3D CAD vs. BIM

Again an excellent thread that elaborates and incorporates prior posts.

A theme, one with which I agree, was well put by several members:

“…the main advantages of BIM software over 3D modeling programs are their ability to work with the operator to create a non-redundant model that actually will make sense to build” sums up why design firms will most likely continue to adopt BIM software.