Course Reflection

This term's course was really a great exploratory course in which our own work served as a great source of the knowledge gained. I loved how it was more of a course that was generally shown and we were allowed to go off and do our own thing, we were able choose our own methods to achieve the goals set forth in this course. Being able to choose our own methods was a great aid to our own learning and encouraging us to be a life and self learner after we leave Drexel and move into our careers.

The exploration into Revit was a great help, knowing that nearly all building engineers are moving into this realm of design. We were able to achieve a more detailed and deep understanding of Revit and the things that can be done within the program. With this sort of program there is always so many functions and tools within the program that it seems impossible to learn them all before the newest version comes out. This course helped to see the inner workings of the newest version and different elements that are held within all the different versions.

I was really happy that I was able to take this course. Being able to see what the future holds for us and I believe that it helped prepare me to expect what is to come and what I will be facing and expected to understand as I progress in my career.

Final Presentation - Architectural and Structural Model Link

Link to Google Docs Presentation
Link to PDF of Paper

Movement Sensors

This week was all about sensors and it was extremely interesting to see how many different sensors are available and used in everyday applications. This week I focused on movement sensors and found that the most used type of movement sensor is called a Passive Infrared Sensor, PIR. This sensor uses heat to detect movement within a given area. This sensor is used in automatic lighting schemes, burglar alarm systems, automatic welcome greetings and even motion detecting remote cameras (see video below). These sensors usually have a range of approximately 20 feet but will practically never wear out, are extremely reliable, incredibly cheap and simple to use.
I thought it was incredibly important to note, especially with the talk of data overload in recent classes the number of readings that single sensors are able to take. Both Junwah Ng , and Xiang Li talked about different senosors, humidity and pressure respectively, but both mentioned the number of measurements each of these sensors can take. Even though the PIR sensor is simple I am sure that there are a number of movement sensors that provide an abundance of measurements that can be recorded to help in disciplines such as traffic studies, population tracking, mass transit security and monitoring and many more. 

References:
http://www.gadgetshack.com/motionsensor.html
http://www.ladyada.net/learn/sensors/pir.html
http://www.instructables.com/id/PIR-Motion-Sensor-Tutorial/
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Databases in Construction

         As Maria said in her post this week, databases are used in so many different ways. For architects and engineers they are being used more and more to store information of real products that they use daily but for construction firms the use of databases seem to be simply less applicable. Some companies have begun to use them for safety information, unions will use them to ease the process of hiring of an employee and keep tract of their jobs but there is still movement in the construction just like in the architectural and engineering worlds.
         A large database was created in 2002 by GSA's Environmental Strategies and Safety Division to help construction companies find and work with disposal companies. I imagine that for a construction firm, especially a large one operating in multiple states or countries, to ensure they are in compliance with disposal standards of the local area that the project is in. This database has put nearly every company that works with construction projects to collect, sort, and process any and all waste generated on the job site. This database has created a very simple and quick way to solve this issue, which in terms of any construction project is a small issue that could have (before this database) taken numerous, time consuming, phone calls and emails just to ensure that waste didn't pile up on your job site delaying the progress.
         There are numerous databases that are being integrated into the construction industry, the waste database is only one example. Databases in construction seem to be pointing the industry in a more efficient and quick path, instead of storing tons of data for products and systems like that in engineering and architecture, they will help the company run smoother, helping to make the background processes run more smoothly.

Term Project

For the term project I will be documenting my exploration of linking Revit and RAM structural analysis software. I will be doing this through the development of a portion of my senior design project in which I am handling the architectural, structural and HVAC design of a recreation center that will be build in Warminster. In order to document this I will be continually taking notes on difficulties, overall things I learn as well as ways that I wished I had done different steps along the way.

I will basically be trying to create a comprehensive how-to of linking RAM and Revit. I wanted to do this because as we have discussed in class the industry that we all want to work in is heading in the direction of completely digital 3D BIMs in order to complete construction projects in the future. I also know that RAM and Revit are two of the most widely used programs in the industry today.

I found Gabrielle Carpenter and Gayaneh Gulbenkian's project idea on Green Buildings. I completely agree with what Gayaneh said in that green building is definitely the way that the industry is headed, even if people don't understand exactly what it is the clients always love to hear that their building will be green. People hear the word green and they all have different ideas about what it means, however, most believe that it is a positive thing. Who can argue with doing our part to save the planet, right? So as for our jobs in the future and how they will include green engineering, I think that each and every one of us can look forward to more and more green design that we will have to figure out how to deal with. With that said, I am extremely interested to see how these two bring it into the intelligent building realm and make this more of a reality for today and not just something that will be down the road.

BIM in Future Construction

In construction, I talked last week about the essentials for incorporating BIM into the design process at every level, from the beginning, including the contractors. This will not only allow for the most proficient design that could be handed to the owner at the time of completion to be used in the future for remodels, additions and maintenance but it will also allow for the most efficient process. I believe that the future will bring in a completely new methodology into the construction world with the incorporation of BIM.

If BIM can be used properly, efficiently and effectively than it would only make sense to develop a new line of construction process into the mix. Like Carpenter said, I believe that BIM will grow increasingly easy to use, not for everyone but for those in the industry it will become a necessity to gain business and a career. If BIM gives us the advances that AutoCAD did then in the next five to ten years it only would seem fitting to see a model of construction process to be developed as outlined below:

-Owner/Architect has general idea and lays out needs, wants and issues to deal with
-The Architect would then create the initial BIM model, possibly utilizing a laser scan of the site to ensure completely accurate information is used whether it is new plot or an existing building that will be remodeled or refurbished.
-After the architectural "shell" is created then the rest of the design team would be chosen, including civil, structural, MEP, specialty contractors and every other necessary member.
-The BIM model would be opened to the entire team allowing for everyone to work simultaneously to complete the design in all aspects.
-Once the design is complete and all clashes were double checked it could then go into construction (construction could possibly begin before hand depending on the project and timeline)

This new model that I am predicting would allow for the most complete and clash free construction process to ever be performed which would not only cut down on cost but, if done properly, would reduce the overall time of construction down dramatically. No one would have to wait around waiting for clashes to be solved with multiply formal rfi's and change orders, all the supplies could arrive exactly when they needed to and be ready when the team was ready because the entire construction process could be planned out to the hour if necessary.

Week 3: BIM for the Construction Industry (Ch. 6)

This week's topic for Group E focused on the advantages of the use of Building Information Modeling in the construction industry and how contractors can benefit from its uses. Chapter 6 of the BIM Handbook supplied us a lot of supporting evidence of the benefits of using BIM for contractors along with some of the challenges that may be faced along the way.

I believe that the Handbook best described the benefits of BIM by saying that “It allows for a smoother and better planned construction process that saves time and money and reduces the potential for errors and conflicts.” Many times contractors are forced to come up with designs for a construction project with very limited information on the building in question because they have to provide these designs in time for the bid meeting. It is not until after winning a construction project that contractors are given much more detailed information to then refine their original designs in order to create building plans (with the traditional design-bid-build approach). These building plans are then limited in what can be done because some of the significant information on the building is not available to the contractor during the design phase. However, with BIM efforts in place early in the design phase of a construction project, contractors and subcontractors are able to coordinate and accurately plan the construction of the building as the project moves along instead of coming across clashes and corrections while in the field and in turn delaying the progress of construction along with increasing the cost of the project as a whole.

Although there are many fields within the construction industry, with the use of BIM prior to construction all of these fields may be tied together in a building information model and the collaboration of all types can be accurately represented in a more organized and timely fashion. BIM application allows contractors to use the model for “estimating, coordination, construction planning, fabrication, procurement, and other functions.” Also, besides having benefits for pre-construction efforts BIM can be used in the field during construction for onsite verification, guidance, and to track the current or previous construction activities as they take place. In conclusion, although the efforts in order to have a construction project effectively use Building Information Modeling and the transition from traditional drawings may be extensive and a bit complicated at first, the benefit of using BIM in construction is immense and I believe BIM will become a very widely used and almost mandatory process in the very near future.


One of my peers Ryan Krall's post on the use of BIM for the Construction Industry (http://ae-510-ay12-13.blogspot.com/2013/01/week-3-ch-6-bim-in-construction.html) made an interesting point in mentioning that "If the model can include every discipline’s drawings within it than there is the potential for not only a zero clash project but also a tool that can be handed over the owner for future maintenance and alterations that they may want to make later on down the road." I thought it was interesting to take into account the uses of BIM in the future of a construction project rather than just during the design and building phases of a project. BIM can be used to keep order to the building's complete life cycle way after construction and far into the future of its maintenance and changes that are made as the building's purpose and uses may change with time to better meet the needs of its users and/or the goals the owner wants to meet with the building.

Week 3 Ch. 6 BIM in Construction

                This week in the 6^th chapter of the BIM Handbook, the integration of BIM in the construction industry as discussed. Before BIM was used widely throughout the industry, and even partially today, there were a multitude of opportunities for clashes to occur. A clash can either be classified as hard or soft, a hard clash is on in which the physical members of a system would not fit within or next to each other, whereas a soft clash is one in which the members may fit together, however, their proximity causes an issue with operation. These clashes were prevalent because we relied on 2D drawings that would be overlaid with other 2D drawings in order to create a complete construction drawing. If changes, dimensions, or locations were not precisely transferred from one set, say structural, of drawings to another set, like the MEP, drawings than there would most definitely be a clash that would need to either be redesigned (causing more cost and lost time) or a field amendment to make it work (which may lead to fittings and installations that are not 100% proper as they were designed to be). By using what is known to be 4D BIM drawing tools, which allows for a 3D model to be presented along with details (4^th dimension) that otherwise might be lost throughout the process. By doing this a single model can contain each and every set of drawings, from architectural to MEP, which drastically reduces the number of clashes that appear throughout the construction process.

                One thing that is needed as the industry transfers over into the BIM world is the inclusion of contractors along with every member of the design team. By making the model more inclusive as opposed to exclusive in terms of those who are working and implementing their own industry designs into the project model the more complete the model becomes. If the model can include every discipline’s drawings within it than there is the potential for not only a zero clash project but also a tool that can be handed over the owner for future maintenance and alterations that they may want to make later on down the road. 
                As  Gayaneh Gulbenkian said BIM is a tool that most importantly reduces costs. It reduces the amount of information that is lost throughout the design and into the construction phase by keeping a record. One of the most beneficial features, I liked Gulbenkian's analogy, is that it updates all aspects of the design when a user updates the model in one of the views, just like Excel will automatically update throughout the spreadsheet as individual numbers change. After being lead to  Gabrielle Carpenter's post by Gulbenkian, it was made clear how crucial the reduction of changes can be. Carpenter showed this by using the Boeing 777 design in which they saved over 6000 changes. Just the time saved by not needing to describe each of those 6000 changes is remarkable. 

The Future of Computer Technology

The future of computers may not be coming soon, but rather alternatives and fancy new appearances and tricks according to Louis Bedigian. Bedigian published "The Future of Computers: Voice Recognition" on Forbes' website in the Personal Finance section. Computers have been changing so rapidly and improving nearly too quickly to follow so it seems natural that the next enormous thing coming to computer technology that will revolutionize how we think of computers is coming soon, but what if it is all an illusion? Bedigian points out one important thing in the apparent evolution of computers, we are not innovating we are altering and replacing.

"True innovation comes from things that users did not know they needed, thus the birth of the mouse and keyboard." This is the issue with computer evolution today. We are getting almost too good at improving and losing all sense of true innovation. We have speech recognition, touch screens (both of which replace keyboards), touch pads, shortcuts, mouse wheels and a whole slew of other devices which replace the computer mouse. But when was the last time that a truly innovative computer technology emerged? None that I can remember, sure there have been incredibly remarkable leaps that have been made in speed, simplicity, size, appearance, and much else but we still typically use the same things we have been for decades. 

We all see things in movies that seem like the next big thing that make us say things like, "that's it, if they were to ACTUALLY produce that it would make millions!" Things like Iron Man's hollographic computer, the Smithsonian's hollographic animator (as seen in Bones), or even things like Ghostrider (the robot car). But they are still all replacements. I am personally not even innovative enough to think about how any of these possibilities or concepts could make way for a truly innovative technology, but I hope that I will be able to see that next, truly innovative, big thing come along in my life time. But it could truly be decades still till that actually happens. 

Some of the true new tools that will most likely replace typical items we use daily in the near future (3-10 years) are things like true speech recognition that will never stumble over our words, perfectly "thinking" computers to respond and answer our questions, wearable computers that make our daily life even more technologically filled with computers we can wear as glasses that will remember people for us, watches that will remind us of every meeting right when we need to remember or refrigerators that text us the list of everything we need to get when we arrive at the store. All of these ideas, and I am sure many more, are real technologies that we will see before we see our children go to college. 

I think that the other posts, within Group-E, showed other great expectations that are very realistic for the future of computer hardware. I personally think that the ability for us to have 3D displays that do not need special glasses or anything like that is going to be the biggest jump that we will see in the next, maybe, 15-20 years. To be able to have 3D displays that are intuitive and not complicated will take a while to develop, but the other crucial challenge will be to make it affordable for everyday purchases. 

Group E Is this the future?

We thought this video showed us how construction can be automated, can lower construction costs, labor costs, construction time, can increase efficiency. We think this kind of technology can be used in the future but most likely to be used along side traditional construction techniques. By looking at the video there seemed to be different sensors, such as on the ceiling and the rovers most likely had sensors to know where they are. It could also show that different materials might need to be used if a building were to be constructed by automated machines. The blocks that the rovers were picking up had white painted strips on each end which was either a marker or a kind of glue. It is the future of construction!

Ryan Krall

My name is Ryan Krall, I am a Senior at Drexel studying Civil Engineering and will graduate with a minor in Architectural Engineering. I took a year off after high school to play semi-professional hockey as a goalie then enrolled at the University of Colorado, where I am originally from. I transferred to Drexel after a search for a good engineering school. I completed one co-op in Greenville, SC, where my fiancé and I plan to live after we get married in July, working with a small structural consulting engineering firm.

I believe that this course should allow us all to leave with a better understanding of how our building designs, no matter what discipline, can be simplified and made more efficient by the technology available.

Intelligent buildings, to me, means that a building is designed in a way that eases the incorporation of a multitude of disciplines and can be tracked throughout the design and construction process. The intelligent building design process should make the entire process much more efficient. 

Civil Engineering Undergraduate Students

Here is the list of Civil Engineering undergraduate students in the course.  This post is also used to create a "label" for each student so it's easy to label your posts later.

Group	Last Name	First Name	Major
E	Alvarado Bastidas	Maria	Civil Engineering
E	Haddad	Issa	Civil Engineering
E	Krall	Ryan	Civil Engineering
E	Lin	Dong	Civil Engineering
E	Rosario	Evan	Civil Engineering