Forums >> General Discussion >> Revit Project Management >> How to divide up the model for quantity survey by area or function?

cmurph

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Hi, wondering if anybody has any advice...we are a large GC firm.  We've been using Revit for a couple years to support our 2D A/E community...mostly modeling for space coordination.  But as more A/E firms switch to Revit, we are starting to get models directly from the designers.  Some are exceptional, some are useless...most are somewhere in the middle.

We are working towards 5D BIM, and we're generating quantities from models for use in our external estimating processes.  We do large projects and we've always used parametric estimating tools that break costs down both by systems (foundation, skin, etc.), and by CSI or Uniformat.  Going further, we almost always break down the projects into logical components by function or type.  For instance, a hotel project may be segregated by guestrooms, common areas, conference rooms, restaurants, etc.  I think this is pretty typical...it certainly helps as we move a project from a conceptual stage to hard design and then afterwards, in terms of historical cost data.

So enough background.  My question specifically:  What is the best way to break a revit model into these components?  We are looking at a job right now, and the first thing we've considered is to "cheat", and use the phasing function...i.e., create phase names that correspond to the different areas of the project.  This seems like an OK workaround because we can clearly segregate the schedules by phase.  But I know that's not the purpose of the phasing functions of Revit.  I can think of several problems it might create.  Then we thought about worksets...again, this is not the function of worksets...but maybe could work.  As we don't do design work, we don't so much care about the intended use of the worksets (for design collaboration) if we could use the function to help us.

Finally, another approach would be to break the model up into several files by cutting and pasting, then linking those files together and extracting quantities file by file.

This question applies whether we build the model, or we work with a design team from conception, or we just get a completed model shipped to us on a new job.  Obviously, the ideal scenario is the middle one...if we work on a team from early on, we can tell the design team how to arrange their model to support our cost estimating.  But still not sure what Revit function they should use to divide up the model?

Thanks in advance, Chris

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coreed

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what you have just descirbed is IPD (Intergrated Project Delivery). Autodesk new headquarters use this method and it is the wave of the future for large GC firms like yours using Revit. they have white papers on the IDP process and their new head quarters. you hit the nail on the head with the statement "the ideal scenario is the middle one...if we work on a team from early on". that is one of the most important concepts of IDP.

also check out this site http://bimx.blogspot.com/  it should give you some insite to your question.

hth

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best regards,

coreed,aia

bmpArchitects,Inc.

"Revit has to be implemented, Not installed." 

Long Live Revit

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cmurph

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coreed, thanks for the very insightful reply...we are taking baby steps with IPD now but recognize its potential to change our industry (for the better).

But still interested in the technical feedback of how best to split up our model...even if we have an early partnership with the design team, I'd like to be able to give them intelligent guidance on this topic.   

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coreed

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in the white paper on IDP projects they give insight on things like how the modeling was done. things like how the model was split up,  to what degree it was modeled, what worked, what didn't. there's stuff at the AU 2009 site also on this. I"ll try to post some links for you this weekend if i think it will be of value to you.

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best regards,

coreed,aia

bmpArchitects,Inc.

"Revit has to be implemented, Not installed." 

Long Live Revit

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