Simulating real world collaboration. Interdisciplinary student projects using BIM

The construction industry is evolving as a reaction to modifications of the legislation for public tenders, higher performance requirements as well as awareness of quality problems and an often inefficient production process. For this evolution to take place, a fundamental change in the global building process is necessary. This implies also the need for corresponding changes in the curricula of all construction related disciplines. In the traditionally building process the programming and the sketch design phase involve mainly the building owner and the architect, neglecting possibly important contributions from other actors to deal with increased complexity and avoid late and costly changes of the initial design. Also at project delivery an important part of relevant information from the construction phase is not transferred to the owner or facility manager. This often causes unnecessary additional cost and discomfort. An alternative approach is to gather all involved parties early on, by forming so-called “Building teams”, where owner, architects, engineers, contractors and other consultants are grouped to join forces. As a consequence, the different tasks and responsibilities within the building team have to be clearly defined and indicated in chronological order together with specifications for the corresponding information flow. To ensure the correct information flow, making agreements and describing the flow becomes a logical step and serves as a base for a proper choice of software tools and their use. Earlier research projects have studied how the building process can be organized in a more efficient way. Introducing this knowledge into the education of the different engineering disciplines is the main goal of the present research project: “Communication and management of digital building information in a multidisciplinary team during the construction process” (COM.BI, OOF-project 2011/24, [1]). This is achieved by implementing collaboration in building teams and introducing innovative software tools. Since all building-related disciplines are represented within the KU Leuven Association, there is an opportunity to form multi-disciplinary student teams and to share knowledge from different fields of research and professional experience. In this project students and lecturers from KAHO Sint-Lieven, Master of Science in Industrial Engineering: Civil Engineering, Professional Bachelor in Construction and Electromechanics, LUCA, Sint-Lucas Architecture: Master of Science in the Architecture, KU Leuven: Master of Engineering Science: Civil Engineering, Architecture and Energy closely collaborate.

ISBN:978-2-87352-004-5

Jaar van publicatie:2013

Toegankelijkheid:Open