In their eternal mission to become bigger, better, and more efficient, many of the businesses of the world are turning to “big data” collection and analysis to inform the way they approach projects. Building information modeling (BIM) is no exception, with builders, architects, and modelers increasingly recognizing the value that a good big data system can offer throughout the design and construction of buildings.
If you’re interested in becoming an engineering CAD technician, you’ll learn all about BIM during your training. Curious about how you can use big data yourself in your future career? Here’s a look at some of the ways it can benefit you.
Big Data Is Useful for Costing With BIM
One of the primary advantages of using BIM for the design and modeling of structures is that it is possible to include costing information right there in the project. This allows for a viewer to see which parts of a building cost how much, and where some costs could be trimmed. With a large data set accumulated over time, the concept can be taken further, and allow for a deeper analysis than mere materials costs.
Big data makes it easy to gain deeper insight into the finances behind construction modeling
For instance, it might reveal that the use of certain components or materials frequently requires more labour than expected, thus leading to cost overruns, and should, therefore, be avoided. Or, it could also allow for forecasting of potential issues relating to the construction process, and how that could affect costs. There are many potential applications for big data to enhance financial planning for construction projects, making this a tool worth exploring after your engineering CAD technicians diploma.
Engineering CAD Technicians Use Big Data for Tracking Assets
Throughout the process of designing and building structures, a great many assets—like building materials, equipment, and more—will need to be procured, stored, and transported, all of which takes time. While BIM applications like Revit can help a bit with tracking production times and other temporal data, the sheer amount of materials involved can nonetheless make this process a little unwieldy.
Making use of big data techniques can help. Transforming every bit of material into points of data, and setting up a database system of alerts and reminders when those data points are moved to different locations, or enter a new phase of a project (for example, from “planning” to “building”), can help make the process of tracking all of the different materials simpler. Revit can easily integrate with database platforms, making it relatively straightforward to do this sort of data-driven work, should you want to do so.
Big Data is a Great Tool for Creating Effective Designs
In the earliest stages of a project, it is the design and modeling of a project that will take center stage, and this work will inform the unfolding of the rest of the work that follows as a structure is built. At an organization that has access to a wealth of historical construction data, it could be possible to gain insight into the kinds of structural design decisions that have traditionally succeeded in creating a functioning and healthy building, and also into the ones that have been less successful.
Valuable design insights can be gleaned from big data analysis
When you begin your career as an engineering CAD technician, you can make use of this information to ensure that you create models that are resistant to weather and other outside factors, have good airflow, are bright enough, and meet other targets for livability and function. Between the skills, you will have built in your training, and the extra guidance on offer by big data, you would be able to model great structures, confident that they will be exactly what the client needs.
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