Our office is attempting to complete a project in Revit for the first time, and we're having some issues with the project budget.
Background info: The project involves a series of relatively simple modern residences - nothing too tricky in terms of geometry. Schematic design has been completed in Autocad, and we'd like to finish DD and CDs in Revit. Most of the staff on this project has had a week's worth of Revit training, but this will be our first project in the office.
After budgeting some time to convert our schematic plans/elevations into a Revit model, we're wondering how the switch will affect manpower/hour projections through the rest of the project. Does anyone have any experience with the transition? Can you give any sort of % increase over normally budgeted autocad hours in a phase for a transition to Revit? Any information would be greatly appreciated.
recipe for disaster. you should just finish up in ACAD. start your next project fully from revit. expect things to take 2-3x as long (with all of a week's worth of training). all this will lead to is "well, we did a project in revit (that we had already taken to a certain level) and it ended up such a money loser that we won't use reivt again..." there is validity to just jumping in, but if you are already having some issues with the project budget, you'd better make sure there's some water in the pool...
Go ahead and Model the buildings...but export your elevations and sections and detail it in ACAD. Don't get me wrong, I love REVIT for detailing and CDs, but this may take time way form just banging em out. I mean REVIT does do modeling very fast!,,..just coordinting details with the model on a training crunch will get you.
JST, the process i've heard that works is just the opposite of what you are doing. schem des in revit, then transition to acad, all the while keeping the model updated in a parallel development.
i disagree with emaze... to a degree. there is certainly less risk involved in sticking with something you know. but i don't imagine expecting 200-300 percent increase in production time/money.
i just sent to bid 2 of our firms first Revit projects. and there is a bit of learning curve... but it does depend on the staff. are they young and likely to pick up a new piece of software? are the eager to use it? this will certainly happen with the transition. I will admit there are a lot of obstacles along the way, but if you have the interest in figuring it out, learning revit is very rewarding.
we started our projects in revit, with a bit of schematic massing in sketchup. so the conversion process is most definately an extra. but, besides that, i don't think it could possibly take twice as long in acad. heck, depending on how SD went (massive changes? different schemes?) you would have probably spent a lot more time and money in Revit SD than in ACAD, the difference would be that you'd have a model that you could turn into CD's fairly easily, but the process would have been much slower. see, it's not necessarily about saving or spending more money in the process overall. the biggest adjustment is the shift in the burden, from the end to the front of the design.
now, i'm not sure what contingency our firm put the budget as a goal, but the production team met it. all four of us were learning revit for the first time. and the buildings were fairly complex. (no curvy-wurvys)
just my 2 cents. is your structural engineer going to be in revit? MEP?
i guess that i'm thinking if you give yourself 2x as long as it would have taken, you still might be ok. the first revit project i worked on was similar in status to what JST is describing. Looking back, it took twice as long as it would have to get it out the door (lots of "why can't i make it do this, that's not the way _insert previous program_ did it). personally, it would have been a better use of thought in retorspect to spend the energy on a "fresh" project...
Our structural engineer is using this project to attempt transitioning to Revit as well. MEP is not.
Also in consideration is the fact that we've spent a fair amount of money on Revit training for the staff, and if we don't use it on this project, we might as well have thrown that money away. (almost 2 months has already passed) Basically, unless experience has indicated that there is a massive increase (aka greater than the cost of training) in cost/time, we're sort of committed to using Revit somewhere along the line.
This may sound contrary to my original advice...
Similarly, on my first couple projects, I bailed on REVIT half way through and went back to ACAD. its easy to do....but...now I would never dream of it..once you do one whole project in REVIT, then you'll never go back. Your team will probably like it better than CAD, and morale will boost.
ok, well that's the way it is here. (large AE firm with everything in house) Structure won't do a complex project WITHOUT revit. Where as the MEP guys are a bunch of whining pussies about learning a new program.
having both arch and structural in revit is a big big advantage. understand this though: structural engineers are new to this modelling business. it will take some time to work out the kinks in communication, and model updating etc. there is another shift in the burden of the work as well. for instance:
they've been doing all their drawing in 2d. their understanding of the project is generated from the notes and data in their tables. not from the visual appearance. so, they aren't used to correcting the actual height and properties of beam in the software. they are used to drawing a line and calling it "x, y, z" so, it may be challenging at first to get them to update their model and draw the deck on top of the joist, and the joist seat on top of the beam. i can't tell you how many times i'd cut a section in my model and see the struct was all overlapped. so, that's the catch, you are relying on structural to produce an accurate model, unlike in cad when you drew the structure from interpreting their drawings. so, time goes from arch -> struct. (but i'm not sure you want to tell your engineer that)
just something to lookout for...
and ff33degrees point is interesting and reveals more than you think. there are a lot of stumbling blocks. instead of learning to draw a line, and then using that line to draw a wall, a roof, and a door, in revit you must learn to draw each of those components. so, basically you get stuck everytime you want to do something new. however!, at the end of the project, revit simply makes the boring monotonous tasks, (schedules, sheet setup, etc) so easy and quick. and that's the part of the project nobody wants to do. also, a lot of the benefits from revit don't really happen till the end of the project, which is why you may want to bail early. (thats what i read into that post)
oh... and because revit is fast, i have the time to write extremely long posts apparently. aight, time to limit my archinecting.
I assume the modeling and the ease of modeling-to-CD's benefits of Revit are still very worthwhile even if none of the consultants are using it? Has Revit become the heir-apparent of BIM software? Seem crazy, but within a small office we have AutoCAD Architecture 2008, a seat of Bentley, and one new seat of Revit, which no one knows how to use.
coordinating with MEP in our office is done through exporting ACAD drawings. not difficult to do, not time consuming at all.
with structural not in revit, you will probably spend time building their structural components within your model. it wouldn't be too different than what you do now, as you probably read the structural drawings, interpret, and draw the structure in your 2d cad drawings. (btw, you do not need Revit Structure to build most structural components.)
going the other way: you link the files into the revit model, behaves just like acad, except it's white backround.
so outthere, the time in takes you to coordinate with other disciplines probably won't change. however, if your consultants are in revit, coordination becomes immediate and non-negotiable. it may speed things up a bit, but the real pay-off is in not letting coordination items slip through the cracks, you're checking your consultant's model, nothing lost in the "interpretation" of their drawings, they can't miss a correction or comment...and your intern can't fudge a location of a beam.
and... i think our MEP guys are coming around... if i can show them they can use the Revit file with TraneTrace (anyone here use "IES"?)
i've made the inadvertant mistake of appearing that I learn software fairly well, which is odd, since I've never taken any CAD classes of any kind. Computers in general aren't really my favorite thing, and i'm definitely no expert. In any case, my new task at hand will be creating CD's for a new 4-story 70,000 SF clinic....in Revit. I suppose I should open up Revit and take a look at it at some point...then it's let the dumb questions begin!
with new software like Revit, every firm needs to anticipate that there's going to be a burn-in period while people and teams figure out just how different it's going to be.
to expect a routine project budget to absorb the full ramp-up costs of a new platform like Revit is, in my opinion, misguided. some portion of that cost should be considered a R&D expense by the firm. this should be made explicit and the project manager evaluated accordingly.
with that in mind, I tend to favor learning many of the important "implementation lessons" on a small, quick project. that approach will give you a fast overview of most of the implementation issues and force you to come to grips with finding solutions to those issues.
to risk the success a major project by using it as a test-bed for a new platform seems to me an inappropriate and dangerous notion
Well taken points, Quiz, although I don't make the rules, I merely enforce them.
What will be doing is mirror-ing our way along in both Revit, which is new, and our fall-back familiar software. It is definitely viewed as an R&D expense -- which, in my opinion is the right approach -- really, NO project/client should pay quite that directly for new software training.
Having said, I think at some point, with some project, you WILL have a "test-bed" situation whether that feels approporiate and non-dangerous to you or not. Otherwise, how would new software ever get implemented?
With proper training and a helpdesk you can call on, makes it possible and easy to do large projects for the first time. I know firms that done health care centers and airports as their first projects with great success. Can you imagine making a million roomtags in autocad and updating every room manually. My god.....
SOM first project in revit was the freedom tower. Not the smallest project to start with, but then again, they rarely have small projects to pilot on.
all I'm suggesting is not to learn the basic lessons on a big, risky project - tryout the new software on a small, manageable project, then take what you've learned from that exercise and apply it to increasingly complex projects.
The reason i say a big project is because that is where the BIM will give you benefits when working with consultants and contractors who also use the model to model the MPE in 3d and for materials and takeoffs on site.
you're right quiz, when it comes to risk, who wants to go into the process blindly... but i think what antithesis & harold are getting at is closer to breaking down BIM into its own advantages and disadvantages.
where and when do we see gains with Revit?
you may not see an advantage to drawing details, coordinating with disciplines, making design changes, etc. You probably won't see any of those advantages till the staff is throroughly trained and engrained in the BIM mindset.
However, you do see immediate gains in organization, and document QA/QC. On larger projects this turns into more dollars, more reliable documentation, etc.
So, its not how much you risk, but maybe "where" you risk it. That probably doesn't make too much sense, but the argument isn't that a large project will absorb the loss. The large project just stands to gain more with a BIM software. (and these gains can be immediate and apparent)
josh, free? i had no idea, i'm gonna wade through their agreement now. I had seen GBS before, but free sounds crazy... oh, it looks like you only get 5 rooms for free...
man, i should just stop posting, i sound like a salesman.
Jan 23, 08 6:40 pm ·
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REVIT Time Implication
Our office is attempting to complete a project in Revit for the first time, and we're having some issues with the project budget.
Background info: The project involves a series of relatively simple modern residences - nothing too tricky in terms of geometry. Schematic design has been completed in Autocad, and we'd like to finish DD and CDs in Revit. Most of the staff on this project has had a week's worth of Revit training, but this will be our first project in the office.
After budgeting some time to convert our schematic plans/elevations into a Revit model, we're wondering how the switch will affect manpower/hour projections through the rest of the project. Does anyone have any experience with the transition? Can you give any sort of % increase over normally budgeted autocad hours in a phase for a transition to Revit? Any information would be greatly appreciated.
recipe for disaster. you should just finish up in ACAD. start your next project fully from revit. expect things to take 2-3x as long (with all of a week's worth of training). all this will lead to is "well, we did a project in revit (that we had already taken to a certain level) and it ended up such a money loser that we won't use reivt again..." there is validity to just jumping in, but if you are already having some issues with the project budget, you'd better make sure there's some water in the pool...
I say..
Go ahead and Model the buildings...but export your elevations and sections and detail it in ACAD. Don't get me wrong, I love REVIT for detailing and CDs, but this may take time way form just banging em out. I mean REVIT does do modeling very fast!,,..just coordinting details with the model on a training crunch will get you.
JST, the process i've heard that works is just the opposite of what you are doing. schem des in revit, then transition to acad, all the while keeping the model updated in a parallel development.
i disagree with emaze... to a degree. there is certainly less risk involved in sticking with something you know. but i don't imagine expecting 200-300 percent increase in production time/money.
i just sent to bid 2 of our firms first Revit projects. and there is a bit of learning curve... but it does depend on the staff. are they young and likely to pick up a new piece of software? are the eager to use it? this will certainly happen with the transition. I will admit there are a lot of obstacles along the way, but if you have the interest in figuring it out, learning revit is very rewarding.
we started our projects in revit, with a bit of schematic massing in sketchup. so the conversion process is most definately an extra. but, besides that, i don't think it could possibly take twice as long in acad. heck, depending on how SD went (massive changes? different schemes?) you would have probably spent a lot more time and money in Revit SD than in ACAD, the difference would be that you'd have a model that you could turn into CD's fairly easily, but the process would have been much slower. see, it's not necessarily about saving or spending more money in the process overall. the biggest adjustment is the shift in the burden, from the end to the front of the design.
now, i'm not sure what contingency our firm put the budget as a goal, but the production team met it. all four of us were learning revit for the first time. and the buildings were fairly complex. (no curvy-wurvys)
just my 2 cents. is your structural engineer going to be in revit? MEP?
good points, postal.
i guess that i'm thinking if you give yourself 2x as long as it would have taken, you still might be ok. the first revit project i worked on was similar in status to what JST is describing. Looking back, it took twice as long as it would have to get it out the door (lots of "why can't i make it do this, that's not the way _insert previous program_ did it). personally, it would have been a better use of thought in retorspect to spend the energy on a "fresh" project...
Our structural engineer is using this project to attempt transitioning to Revit as well. MEP is not.
Also in consideration is the fact that we've spent a fair amount of money on Revit training for the staff, and if we don't use it on this project, we might as well have thrown that money away. (almost 2 months has already passed) Basically, unless experience has indicated that there is a massive increase (aka greater than the cost of training) in cost/time, we're sort of committed to using Revit somewhere along the line.
This may sound contrary to my original advice...
Similarly, on my first couple projects, I bailed on REVIT half way through and went back to ACAD. its easy to do....but...now I would never dream of it..once you do one whole project in REVIT, then you'll never go back. Your team will probably like it better than CAD, and morale will boost.
...possibly
ok, well that's the way it is here. (large AE firm with everything in house) Structure won't do a complex project WITHOUT revit. Where as the MEP guys are a bunch of whining pussies about learning a new program.
having both arch and structural in revit is a big big advantage. understand this though: structural engineers are new to this modelling business. it will take some time to work out the kinks in communication, and model updating etc. there is another shift in the burden of the work as well. for instance:
they've been doing all their drawing in 2d. their understanding of the project is generated from the notes and data in their tables. not from the visual appearance. so, they aren't used to correcting the actual height and properties of beam in the software. they are used to drawing a line and calling it "x, y, z" so, it may be challenging at first to get them to update their model and draw the deck on top of the joist, and the joist seat on top of the beam. i can't tell you how many times i'd cut a section in my model and see the struct was all overlapped. so, that's the catch, you are relying on structural to produce an accurate model, unlike in cad when you drew the structure from interpreting their drawings. so, time goes from arch -> struct. (but i'm not sure you want to tell your engineer that)
just something to lookout for...
and ff33degrees point is interesting and reveals more than you think. there are a lot of stumbling blocks. instead of learning to draw a line, and then using that line to draw a wall, a roof, and a door, in revit you must learn to draw each of those components. so, basically you get stuck everytime you want to do something new. however!, at the end of the project, revit simply makes the boring monotonous tasks, (schedules, sheet setup, etc) so easy and quick. and that's the part of the project nobody wants to do. also, a lot of the benefits from revit don't really happen till the end of the project, which is why you may want to bail early. (thats what i read into that post)
oh... and because revit is fast, i have the time to write extremely long posts apparently. aight, time to limit my archinecting.
I assume the modeling and the ease of modeling-to-CD's benefits of Revit are still very worthwhile even if none of the consultants are using it? Has Revit become the heir-apparent of BIM software? Seem crazy, but within a small office we have AutoCAD Architecture 2008, a seat of Bentley, and one new seat of Revit, which no one knows how to use.
nice summary postal.
Start using Revit now and accept the short term consequences... It will pay off for you in the end.
: "Whereas the MEP guys are a bunch of whining pussies about learning a new program.
Love it ... so true, in my experience.
if they are pussies you need to fuck them or they will never be happy
I know this is an old post but.. does your Structural Engineer and MEP guys have to use revit inorder for the project to be properly coordinated??
P.S. JSC hows your project coming
yes.
coordinating with MEP in our office is done through exporting ACAD drawings. not difficult to do, not time consuming at all.
with structural not in revit, you will probably spend time building their structural components within your model. it wouldn't be too different than what you do now, as you probably read the structural drawings, interpret, and draw the structure in your 2d cad drawings. (btw, you do not need Revit Structure to build most structural components.)
going the other way: you link the files into the revit model, behaves just like acad, except it's white backround.
so outthere, the time in takes you to coordinate with other disciplines probably won't change. however, if your consultants are in revit, coordination becomes immediate and non-negotiable. it may speed things up a bit, but the real pay-off is in not letting coordination items slip through the cracks, you're checking your consultant's model, nothing lost in the "interpretation" of their drawings, they can't miss a correction or comment...and your intern can't fudge a location of a beam.
and... i think our MEP guys are coming around... if i can show them they can use the Revit file with TraneTrace (anyone here use "IES"?)
i've made the inadvertant mistake of appearing that I learn software fairly well, which is odd, since I've never taken any CAD classes of any kind. Computers in general aren't really my favorite thing, and i'm definitely no expert. In any case, my new task at hand will be creating CD's for a new 4-story 70,000 SF clinic....in Revit. I suppose I should open up Revit and take a look at it at some point...then it's let the dumb questions begin!
Revit to TraneTRace
Export gbxml and upload to the green building studio. GBS will convert your file to a tranetrace compatible format.
Done. FREE!
j
1st implementations of Revit or any other new BIM software are not for small buildings with small budgets
with new software like Revit, every firm needs to anticipate that there's going to be a burn-in period while people and teams figure out just how different it's going to be.
to expect a routine project budget to absorb the full ramp-up costs of a new platform like Revit is, in my opinion, misguided. some portion of that cost should be considered a R&D expense by the firm. this should be made explicit and the project manager evaluated accordingly.
with that in mind, I tend to favor learning many of the important "implementation lessons" on a small, quick project. that approach will give you a fast overview of most of the implementation issues and force you to come to grips with finding solutions to those issues.
to risk the success a major project by using it as a test-bed for a new platform seems to me an inappropriate and dangerous notion
Well taken points, Quiz, although I don't make the rules, I merely enforce them.
What will be doing is mirror-ing our way along in both Revit, which is new, and our fall-back familiar software. It is definitely viewed as an R&D expense -- which, in my opinion is the right approach -- really, NO project/client should pay quite that directly for new software training.
Having said, I think at some point, with some project, you WILL have a "test-bed" situation whether that feels approporiate and non-dangerous to you or not. Otherwise, how would new software ever get implemented?
With proper training and a helpdesk you can call on, makes it possible and easy to do large projects for the first time. I know firms that done health care centers and airports as their first projects with great success. Can you imagine making a million roomtags in autocad and updating every room manually. My god.....
SOM first project in revit was the freedom tower. Not the smallest project to start with, but then again, they rarely have small projects to pilot on.
all I'm suggesting is not to learn the basic lessons on a big, risky project - tryout the new software on a small, manageable project, then take what you've learned from that exercise and apply it to increasingly complex projects.
I'll just keep telling myself it's no more complicated than sketchup...
The reason i say a big project is because that is where the BIM will give you benefits when working with consultants and contractors who also use the model to model the MPE in 3d and for materials and takeoffs on site.
you're right quiz, when it comes to risk, who wants to go into the process blindly... but i think what antithesis & harold are getting at is closer to breaking down BIM into its own advantages and disadvantages.
where and when do we see gains with Revit?
you may not see an advantage to drawing details, coordinating with disciplines, making design changes, etc. You probably won't see any of those advantages till the staff is throroughly trained and engrained in the BIM mindset.
However, you do see immediate gains in organization, and document QA/QC. On larger projects this turns into more dollars, more reliable documentation, etc.
So, its not how much you risk, but maybe "where" you risk it. That probably doesn't make too much sense, but the argument isn't that a large project will absorb the loss. The large project just stands to gain more with a BIM software. (and these gains can be immediate and apparent)
josh, free? i had no idea, i'm gonna wade through their agreement now. I had seen GBS before, but free sounds crazy... oh, it looks like you only get 5 rooms for free...
man, i should just stop posting, i sound like a salesman.
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