Value Proposition of COBie at University of Washington

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2015Building Information Modeling (BIM), has been practiced for several years by designers and contractors in design and construction phases. After receiving a positive feedback of the BIM in industry, owners are now interested in getting the benefits of the BIM in operations and maintenance. The information value produced during each phases of the project drops in phase transfer during the building lifecycle, and this drop has the highest value in transition from construction to operations and maintenance (O&M). BIM can capture the O&M information produced during the phases of pre-design, design, and construction, and transfer it to the operations and maintenance phase. Construction Operations Building Information Exchange (COBie) was developed by the US Army Corps of Engineers as a method of delivering O&M information and project specific data in a standardized format. COBie can be extracted from BIM, and be imported to Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) of the owner where the maintenance work orders are managed. The value of COBie for Facility Management is determined in two phases of turn over, and operations and maintenance. The value of COBie at University of Washington in turn over phase was investigated previously, and this research study focuses mainly on the value of COBie in operations and maintenance. Interviews with Facility Services (FS) employees were conducted to understand the work order work flows, and how COBie can impact it. The challenges FS employees are facing performing the work orders are related to two categories of sources and processes, and research study has investigated how COBie can address these challenges and help the work order process. Based on the interview result analysis, since COBie can provide comprehensive O&M data from the first day of operations with high accuracy, it can considerably ease the work order process. But FS employees are also reliant on other sources and documents like as-build plans and O&M manuals to get information to perform work orders. COBie is not enough on its own to provide all the information needed for Facility Management, but based on the COBie standard and the data provided in each project, FS employees can be less reliant on other sources than COBie

Effects of Using Virtual Reality on AEC Team Collaboration

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Washington, 2019Construction projects require coordination of different disciplines, which makes knowledge management and information exchange crucial in design and construction teams. Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a powerful technology for communication and information management but has limitations in terms of the ways project stakeholders interact with design visualizations. The current method of collaboration with BIM limits the participation of all team members since the 3D model is presented on a 2D shared screen while one person has the control over the viewpoint and can create markups. Virtual Reality (VR) is a technology that provides an environment that enables each participant to have their individual point of view and markup tool while virtually collaborating with other team members in a simulated walkthrough of the project. Designers and builders need to exchange disciplinary knowledge while they vet design alternatives during different phases of the project.  Project team members have in-depth knowledge in the area of their expertise, but they share a part of their knowledge understandable by other team members in explaining design ideas, disciplinary constraints, and technical analysis to collaborate, find solutions, and make decisions. This phenomenon is referred to as Shared Understanding. This dissertation studies the effects of VR’s immersive environment and markup tool capabilities on building Shared Understanding among AEC project team members in asynchronous and synchronous 3D coordination processes. The research study results show that VR’s immersive environment can provide a better understanding of the model to the users in comparison to BIM, and it can assist in understanding the design issues and system conflicts. Most of the participants in the asynchronous research study preferred VR over BIM to understand the technical annotations made by VR’s markup tool in the 360-degree environment while BIM provides markups on a 2D screenshot of the 3D model. They also found verbal communication in VR more effective than text in the BIM platform. The synchronous research study results show that teams spent less time in VR to build Shared Understanding of the team decision. The 3D coordination meeting duration in VR was significantly lower than the meeting duration where teams used BIM. Participants found VR’s markup tool capabilities and immersive environment as features missing in BIM that assisted in team collaboration and building Shared Understanding, however there were reported drawbacks in collaboration in VR. Team members could get disoriented in the 360-degree environment and the team leads were not always sure if all team members are following the markups in the environment

Immersive VR versus BIM for AEC Team Collaboration in Remote 3D Coordination Processes

Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Virtual Reality (VR) are both tools for collaboration and communication, yet questions still exist as to how and in what ways these tools support technical communication and team decision-making. This paper presents the results of an experimental research study that examined multidisciplinary Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) team collaboration efficiency in remote asynchronous and synchronous communication methods for 3D coordination processes by comparing BIM and immersive VR both with markup tools. Team collaboration efficiency was measured by Shared Understanding, a psychological method based on Mental Models. The findings revealed that the immersive experience in VR and its markup tool capabilities, which enabled users to draw in a 360-degree environment, supported team communication more than the BIM markup tool features, which allowed only one user to draw on a shared 2D screenshot of the model. However, efficient team collaboration in VR required the members to properly guide each other in the 360-degree environment; otherwise, some members were not able to follow the conversations

Effects of Virtual Reality on Complex Building System Recall

Multidisciplinary design and construction teams are challenged to communicate and coordinate across complex building systems, including architectural, structural, mechanical, electrical, and piping (MEP). To support this coordination, disciplinary 3D models are combined and coordinated before installation. Studies show that besides the use of 3D models, industry professionals sketch building components to discuss coordination issues and find resolutions that require them to recall the building components in the model. In current practices, 3D models are explored with Building Information Modeling (BIM) tools presented on 2D screens, while Virtual Reality (VR) can provide users with an immersive environment to explore. This paper presents the results of an experiment that studied the effects of VR’s immersive environment on the participants’ complex MEP system recall compared to BIM via sketching. The comparison criteria were the 3D geometry properties of the piping system and the users’ self-awareness in the model categorized under color, shape, dimension, piping, and viewpoint. The results showed significant improvement in recall of shape, dimension, and piping when the model was explored in VR