Desktop Engineering (DTE) Blog

Desktop Engineering Blog

#BeyondBIM2021 Symposium Highlights

Key TakeAways 

"Change is certainly coming and there’s much to learn from manufacturing for some areas of AEC"

Dale Sinclair, AECOM

Desktop Engineering recently concluded its annual BeyondBIM virtual event with a broad consensus that in the future the construction industry needs to grasp new technologies to drive improved processes, together with recognising the need to train in these new methods.

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Topics: Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM), #HowCanWeHelpYou?

#BeyondBIM2020 presentations

'A Vision for the Future'

#BeyondBIM2020 AEC symposium moved from a one day event in London to a digital platform for 2020 with live webinar presentations from speakers scheduled over a couple of weeks.

Leading members of the Architecture, Engineering, Construction community presented case studies and discussions on the future vision of building, highlighting examples and projects where BIM is used and evolved into aiding the fabrication and construction process.

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Topics: Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM)

Building Experience Modeling Era

The design revolution is now and a new era has begun! Welcome to the Building Experience Modeling (BEM) era!  This generation has been given the task to design and build sustainable green buildings using renewable resources, reliably and safely - in less time and with unnecessary outlay of costs.

Delivering these complex solutions with reliability and precision is a challenge facing the building industry.  With the introduction of new innovative tools available, designers are able to go from 2D to 3D CAD - using Building Information Modeling (BIM) methodology to digitally create design simulations to manage all the information associated with architectural projects.

(While Computer Aided Design (CAD) creates 2-dimensional (2D) or 3-dimensional (3D) drawings that don't distinguish between elements, BIM incorporates 4D (time) and 5D (costs) allowing users to manage information throughout project lifecycle intelligently, whilst automating processes such as programming, conceptual and detailed design, analysis, documentation, manufacturing, construction logistics, maintenance, building operations, renovations or demolition.)

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM), CATIA

Intelligent 3D Curtain Wall Design

Goethe said that “By seeking and blundering we learn ....

Well I am not so sure that I would like to start a career in engineering knowing I was blundering in order to learn. But his point is bluntly put - that what we call 'knowledge' is gained through making mistakes. In other words, engineers push the envelope in design, making things bigger or lighter until they fail and then seeking out what went wrong.

In some cases, this leads to fundamental research to capture the laws of nature in formulae. In other cases, it leads to best practice or rules. This is how the aerospace industry has made flying one of the safest modes of transport.

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Topics: Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM)

#BeyondBIM2019

Current practice in architectural and engineering design involves workflow methods that can have many stages and steps that challenge the efficacy and quality of the design and construction process.  Unnecessary costs accrue through design collaboration delays and redesign or rework at any stage which challenges the business model of all participants.

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM), Dassault Systemes, Training, CATIA

Adaptive Building Design

In recent years many papers, both government whitepapers, research document and industry guru’s have voiced concern on the poor productivity within the construction industry.

Comparisons have been made with manufacturing industry where overall productivity has doubled over 20-30 years. So how did that industry achieve such gains and construction didn’t?

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM), Dassault Systemes, CATIA

Dropbox and BIM

Dropbox is used very frequently amongst companies within the construction industry as a mechanism to share information. Its cheap, easy to use and available to synchronise files across many hardware platforms. It is easy to see why it has been taken up by many small, medium and even large organisations to help them manage BIM (Building Information Modeling) information on building projects.

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Building Information Modelling (BIM), Dassault Systemes

CATIA 3DEXPERIENCE contributes to 2 Construction Awards

The 3DEXPERIENCE platform from Dassault Systemes has played an important role in winning 2 awards in the Construction industry.

The Institution of Structural Engineers has awarded the 2017 prize for Construction Innovation to the team that designed and built The TallWood House at Brock Commons - an 18-storey mass timber hybrid building at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada.

At 53m high, this student residence building has been recognized as the tallest mass timber hybrid building in the world. It is comprised of 17 storeys of five-ply cross-laminated timber (CLT) floor panels, glue-laminated timber columns.

Key to proving the construction process was the use of 3DEXPERIENCE to simulate the construction methods, from delivery of prefabricated parts to the work processes involved in assembling the building. CADMakers* used the 3DEXPERIENCE platform to simulate in real-time all these interactions and hence improve on methods in a digital world before committing to the real world.

See this video to compare the virtual with the real.

Zaha Hadid Architects used CATIA 3DEXPERIENCE as the platform for the design of the world’s longest asymmetrical single-stay bridge in Taiwan – The Danjiang BridgeThe design teams based in 3 locations across 2 continents used CATIA 3DEXPERIENCE On Cloud as the design and collaboration platform. 

This greatly improved communication of ideas, management of information and enhanced the collaboration across the teams. The design team at Zaha’s were awarded the 2017 innovation in Collaboration Award from the Computing Construction Awards.

Read the full case study here >>

Both these awards show the gains that the construction industry can get from adopting the 3DEXPERIENCE platform as not only a 3D BIM tool but as a collaboration platform on which to store, control and manage all project data – meeting the requirements of BIM Level 3.

*VIRTUAL DESIGN MODELLING: CadMakers Inc

Want to know more?

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Various - CAD CAM FEA PLM, Building Information Modelling (BIM)

Intelligent Rainscreen Façade Video

At Desktop Engineering, we aim to help our customers find ways of doing design or manufacturing quicker and of higher quality using software technologies. One of the approaches we can use is to use a rule based approach to capture knowledge to allow it to be re-used. Rules are those simple set of instructions, something as simple as a cooking recipe, that one follows that determines an outcome. So it is with engineering. Capture those rules and then reuse them in software and then you have design automation.

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM)

How BIM has changed Façade Design

2D or 3D CAD

“Change or die” is the shorted version of Charles Darwin’s famous quote.

A little while ago I was in a meeting with a director of a major developer in London, trying to convince him of using 3D CAD (or BIM) models to help in construction projects and one comment put forcefully to me was

“I’ve built many a building with a pencil, paper and a fax machine so why should I spend money on 3D CAD information?“

I think we have all met these dinosaurs and we know what their future beholds!

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Topics: 3DEXPERIENCE, Architecture, Engineering & Construction, Building Information Modelling (BIM)