An empirical investigation the adoption factors of building information modelling (BIM) from the perspective of Malaysian Civil And Structure Consultant Firms

The construction industry in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0) have to focus on high-technology jobs such as technological skill rather than labour-intensive approach and low-skilled job. But, most of the construction industries in Malaysia are using traditional approach which is labour-intensive approach and it has resulted in fragmentation issue among the project participants resulting less productivity and inefficiency in delivering the project. In order to tackle this issue, Building Information Modelling (BIM) can offer a platform to integrate between different parties in the construction industry. It also offers a lot of benefits to construction industry in term of productivity and efficiency. Even though there are a lot of benefits that can be gained by BIM utilisation and many efforts to increase the adoption of BIM in construction projects such as conducting the seminars, workshops and incentives but, the rate of BIM adoption by the Malaysian construction players is still low compared to other Asians countries. Therefore, there is a need to study the adoption factors within Malaysian construction industry that could facilitate the pace of BIM adoption in Malaysia especially from the perspective of civil and structure (C&S) consultant firms. Several studies had explored the way to increase the pace of BIM adoption from the perspective of architectures, facilities management, quantity surveyor and contractors, and very little effort to identify the adoption factors and its relationship that could facilitate the adoption of BIM especially from the perspective of C&S consultant firms. C&S consultant firm plays a vital role to ensure the design is constructible, operable and maintainable. Thus, the aim of this study is to examine the relationship between organizations, people and technology towards making decisions in adopting BIM from the perspective C&S consultant firm. In this study, qualitative and quantitative approaches have been utilised as research method to develop in-depth understanding of the happening by obtaining the views on the subject studied especially the current application of BIM in the Malaysian construction industry. At the same time, this study is conducted to explore what are the factors that affecting the adoption of BIM in the Malaysian construction industry. Lack of national guideline for implementing BIM, pressure from clients or governments and lacking of technical support from BIM experts are the vital challenges faced by the adopters besides having a higher cost of early investment in BIM technology. Analysis from multiple linear regression revealed the factors that have a strong relationship in influencing organisation to adopt BIM are; having a strong support from the top management, having a coercive pressure, having a clear BIM implementation plan, undergo training, having a BIM competency team, having a clear job specification for new roles, BIM technology must free from interoperability issue, less cost of technology, and the issue of compatibility. This study offers a new insight from the perspective of C&S consultant firms on the adoption of BIM and could improve the rate of BIM adoption. At the same time, it could fill the gap from previous studies by extending the study of BIM adoption by investigating from C&S consultant firm’s point of view and it complementing the overall view of BIM adoption from all participants

The potential of implementing Building Information Modelling (BIM) in Malaysian Construction Industry: An exploratory study

In Malaysia, we cannot deny the widespread of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and the influence of ICT to speed up the working process. Lots of benefits can be gained from utilisation of ICT, especially in construction industry. For decade, construction industry can be considered as a fragmented industry because of lacking of sharing information through its life cycle and with other parties. ICT can be a tool for integrating and collaborating among parties in the construction projects, and Building Information Modelling (BIM) is one of the platforms that can be used to promote the collaboration between parties in the construction projects. Eastman et al., 2011, interpreted BIM as “a digital representation of the building process to aid in exchanging and interoperability information in a digital format." Basically, BIM will act like a respiratory system with full of information to share with for construction projects. Even though there are lots of benefits can be gained by utilisation of BIM, it is a difficult task to convince the construction companies to embrace and implementing it due to some reasons. Since there is a short of understanding of BIM by the construction companies in Malaysia, this paper is intended to review the strategy and action plan from Singapore and Hong Kong in adopting and implement BIM, which could be used in supporting the implementation of BIM in Malaysian Construction Industry. As a summary, this paper revealed that involvement from government, collaboration between government, private sector and universities and awareness program are the most of the important criteria that must be taken into consideration once to developing BIM implementation strategy plan for Malaysian construction industry

Exploring the barriers in implementation of qlassic in Malaysian construction industry from the perspective of contractors

Construction industry is one of the largest contributors to the economy in Malaysia. Many studies have showed the significant of the construction industry contribution but the issues of properties buyers especially still apprehensive in the industry. National House Buyers Association (HBA) has recorded thousands of complaints from buyers who were not satisfied with the condition of their new properties or the way defects were rectified. The main objectives of QLASSIC is to increase the quality of building but after more a decade the implementation of QLASSIC still lagging behind and there are still many developers and contractors are reluctant to use QLASSIC approach in their projects. Therefore, the main goal of this study is to explore the factor hindering the implementation of QLASSIC in Malaysia especially from the contractors' perspective. Questionnaires were used as research instrument for collecting data information, then the data were analysed by using Relative Importance Index (RII). From the analysis, it is found that the main factors that could hinder the implementing of QLASSIC are; lack of coercive and mimetic pressures, lack of capabilities of staff in perform QLASSIC assessment practice due to minor size and type of organisation influence in adopting QLASSIC, higher cost to undergo training to operate QLASSIC's tools and minimal benefits gained when adopting QLASSIC. In conclusion, it's important to tackle the actual factors hindering the implementation of QLASSIC in Malaysian construction industry. Concurrently, every parties in the construction industry should play their roles in promoting the use of QLASSIC in their construction project. Besides that, the government has to make a new strategy in promoting the use of QLASSIC by providing incentive such as tax rebate if the contractors used QLASSIC assessor to access their projects

Design coordination in BIM: Decision criteria for determining tolerances

Building information modeling (BIM) has popularly grown among construction, enabling cross-disciplinary collaborations across the whole life cycle of building construction. Using BIM could improve cost estimates and control, more efficient construction planning and administration, higher design and project quality. However, there are some barriers towards BIM adaptation, including tolerance issues which are the main problems that slow the process of BIM implementation. Thus, this study objective is to identify decision criteria involved in determining the tolerance during BIM-based clash resolution. To do that, the study involves interviewing twenty industry practitioners with experience in managing BIM-based design coordination. The data collected were analyzed using thematic analysis. The analysis results concluded that two criteria groups affect acceptable tolerance: existing standard and project involved categories. The existing standard categories include ‘standard,’ and ‘value.’ While the project involved categories include ‘experience,’ ‘discipline,’’ process,’ and ‘system.’ The research findings would help researchers and industry practitioners determine the tolerance and assist in the BIM implementation

Web based information model to support maintenance and operations management.

Facilities Management (FM) has been considered as facilities maintenance and operation and has a broad range of functions. Because of its nature, information can be lost during maintenance operations and it will affect decision making. Information Technology (IT) may be used as a tool to make an effective decision- making and productivity of the organisation can be further improved through the use of IT. Therefore the used of a Computerised Maintenance Management System (CMMS) as an operational and maintenance management tool can be used. The purpose of a CMMS is to manage, capture, and track inspection, maintenance and repair activities of an organisation, because in a world of increasing information flows, data retrieval becomes more and more important. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to identify the requirement of electronic management for the maintenance department to support their maintenance operations. This research is also aimed to develop and gauge the effectiveness of the proposed framework for an information model called electronic Maintenance Online System (eMOST) to support maintenance and operations at the Office of Development and Asset Management or Pejabat Pembangunan dan Pengurusan Harta (PPPH), Kolej Universiti Kejuruteraan dan Teknologi Malaysia (KUKTEM) as a facility management tool. In this research, Cold Fusion Markup Language and MS Access as a database were used to develop the proposed information model. It starts with developing the process model using IDEFØ notation before transform it into programming language.. Prior to the development of eMOST, quantitative studies had been conducted by using three different sets of questionnaires which were designed to meet the objectives of the study. The first set of questionnaire tackled the issues of maintenance management at higher institutions in Malaysia and the second set of questionnaire is to investigate the customer satisfaction index on the performance of maintenance activities done by PPPH, KUKTEM. The third questionnaire was meant to evaluate the proposed information model i.e eMOST from users’ perspective and perceptions. The results from analysis of the survey data showed that, none of the higher learning institutions in Malaysia used any facility management software or CMMS to assist their maintenance activities as the majority of them were using out-sourcing method to carry out their maintenance activities and therefore the use of eMOST has expedited the response time taken by PPPH

Application of Probabilistic Analysis in Finite Element Modeling of Prestressed Inverted T-Beam with Web Openings

Recent trends of structural mechanics applications in finite element analysis demonstrate an increasing demand for efficient analysis tools. This paper presents a probabilistic analysis approach applied in finite element analysis for modeling prestressed inverted T-beams with web openings structure used in building service system (mechanical, electrical, communications, and plumbing). The experimental program reported in this paper tested four prestressed inverted T-beams with circular web openings to failure to evaluate the openings' effect on various beam behaviors. Using ANSYS, finite element models were developed to simulate beam deflection behavior. Comparison of analytical results with the available experimental results for load deflection relationships showed good agreement between both results. Probabilistic analysis methodology could predict the response (i.e., deflection, stress, strain etc) due to various combination of input variables (i.e.,Poisson`s ratio, modulus of elasticity, etc). In reality, uncertainties exist in a system and environment that may make the application of deterministic design unreliable which causes the values of the variables that are acting on the system cannot be predicted with certainty. As such, probabilistic approach was applied to the model after deterministic analysis. In this study, the probabilistic analysis approach was applied to account for the variability in fabrication. Probabilistic methodology applied in finite element modeling provides another alternative ways of structural analysis of prest stressed inverted T-beams with web openings to achieve a robust and reliable design in a more efficient way. In this study, Monte Carlo simulation was used to analyze the effect of parameter uncertainty for the prestressed inverted T-beams with web openings. From the analysis results, it was observed that the changes in prestressing force, elastic modulus of prestressing steel, ultimate tensile strength of prestressing steel and beam width tend to be the most influencing parameters, which need to be tightly controlled. As a result, from deterministic analysis and probabilistic analysis, it was found that probabilistic analysis tends to be closer to reality than deterministic methods and gives a way of designing for quality

Proactive safety measure using road environment assessment program (REAP)

In Malaysia, reactive crash statistics have becoming very crucial in evaluating road’s safety level and in deciding crash-prone areas known as black spot. The establishments of these statistics normally take years to complete as a result of several well-known setbacks within developing countries. Those obstacles had produced poor crash database having low accessibility, reliability and adequateness of crash data that finally brought major impact to the entire road safety system. In light of that, a proactive safety measure called Road Environment Assessment Program (REAP) has been developed to help evaluating the environment risk factors of a road, calculating the risk index and presented the results through Google Earth platform. REAP was developed based on composite risk index value aggregated from 14 road environment indicators existed in most Malaysia federal roads. Based on the local conditions of the selected roads, specific road environment risk factor were produced where trend and risk level as well as identifications of riskiest road section could be easily identified. REAP is a time-saving and cost-saving tool as it can directly recognize problematic road environment factors while planning on the best and suitable road improvement procedures for problematic sections

Web based information model : electronic maintenance outline system (e-MOST) as a tool to support maintenance and operations management at Pejabat Pembangunan dan Pengurusan Harta, Kolej Universiti Kejuruteraan dan Teknologi Malaysia

The purpose of this study was to develop suitable information model called electronic Maintenance Online System (eMOST) to support maintenance and operations at Pejabat Pembangunan dan Pengurusan Harta (PPPH), Kolej Universiti Kejuruteraan dan Teknologi Malaysia (KUKTEM), and to gauge the effectiveness of the proposed information model. Cold Fusion Markup Language was used to develop the purposed information model. Facilities management (FM) is a broad range of functions such as space management, facilities planning and operational management, because of its nature, gathering information is very important to acquire the accurate information. To gain this information, therefore, quantitative studies had been used to achieve the objective of this research. The quantitative part involved data collecting using three different set of questionnaires which is designed with its own purposes. The first set of questionnaire tackle the issues of maintenance management at higher institutions in Malaysia and found that none of them was using any FM software or Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) to assist their maintenance activities and majority of them using out sourcing to carry out their maintenance activities and the most prominent problem faced by the department of maintenance is the delay on procurement process to select maintenance contractor. The second set of questionnaire is to investigate the customer satisfaction index on the performance of maintenance activities done by PPPH, KUKTEM, and found that the most prominent factor which is not satisfy the customers is the response time taken by PPPH. The third set of questionnaire is to evaluate the proposed information model from users' perspective and perceptions, and found that eMOST have a potential to expedite the response time taken by PPPH. Average Index method has been used to analyze the data to rank the factors which is the content in the three set of questionnaires. From the visit and data gather from the three set of questionnaires , found that, maintenance management is a complex function, which is incorporated with many activities and tasks to fulfill its specific objectives, therefore a working procedure or the framework has been developed as a reference to the practice of maintenance management

Challenges and Obstacles of Adoption BIM Technology in the Construction Industry in Iraq

Lack of application modern information technology in the construction sector in Iraq leads to complexity in understanding and interpreting diagrams and data, especially in large construction projects. Building Information Modeling (BIM) has a vital role in the construction industry through using the intelligent software by all of the specialists in the project team such as Architecture, civil engineer and MEP engineer. By using a new technique, BIM, can be determined and detect all the potential conflicts in design, construction and operation phases. A questionnaire has been designed to investigate perceptions related to BIM challenges and obstacles, besides to the desired benefits from using BIM technique. About 36 valid responses received from interested companies. The responses referred that BIM adoption in Iraqi construction industry was very low. There are many factors prevent or, at least, do not encourage the adoption of BIM technology in the construction industry. The most important factor is the cost of adoption the hardware and software related to the BIM technology and lack of request from owner

Factor Affecting of BIM Technique in the Construction Firms in Iraq

The construction industry in Iraq became much more difficult than before because of complexities in the diagrams and documentations in the construction projects. Building information modeling (BIM) started to appear with entry the foreign companies to build the large projects in Iraq. It is a bode well technique for the construction industry, it has many benefits in all project phases from planning and scheduling to operation and demolition phase. This paper concentrated on the implementation of BIM technology and identify the benefits desired and challenges that reduce adoption this technique in the Iraqi construction industry. A qualitative approach has been used to collect data from two experts in the construction field in Iraq to show the factors affected on using BIM in the Iraqi construction firms. The results indicate to a rare implementation of BIM technology among construction professionals in Iraq. The study recommended encouraging the investment in the Iraqi construction markets to share the knowledge and experiences related to BIM technology between the construction professionals