How BIM (Building Information Modeling) Helps HVAC? | Tejjy Inc.

How BIM (Building Information Modeling) Helps HVAC? Heating, Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC) in the building sector involve a lot of manpower from designing, operation & maintenance at various stages like the system design, load estimate, coordination, scheduling, energy simulation and also for facility operations and maintenance. The diverse stages entail different expertise for executing the activities, leading to a lot of coordination problems. Using BIM at the preconstruction stage of the project facilitates engineers and designers to make improved decisions. All activities associated with project completion can be made easily with 2D, 3D, 4D, 5D, 6D & 7D BIM in a single module. The BIM-enabled solution helps to obtain energy conservation, maintenance & operation of the HVAC system. 

Multidisciplinary Collaboration with Stakeholders, Reducing Rework All project stakeholders need collaboration to work on a project starting from the stage of conceptual designing to the operation & maintenance for streamlining the process of construction as per time, cost & quality. BIM helps in pre-planning the mechanical HVAC process and exactly comprehending design data, by providing information along with visuals in a common data environment. To analyze design & showcase information on multi-dimensional aspects, the BIM model shows all the necessary dimensions from the conceptual stage of the design to operations & maintenance. The design of an HVAC made in CAD can be imported in Revit BIM, identifying different dimensions concerning the design.

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Provision for Making Heat Load Estimation with 2D BIM BIM acts as a single point of reference for information & operational activities having manifold dimensions wherein the 2nd Dimension of the tool in the project provides the provision for making heat load assessments, duct sizing, pipe sizing, and pipe design. Heat load calculations can be executed comprehensively if the specific building properties are provided like the floors, walls, ceiling, slab, sort of building typology, location & activity in the building, lighting & equipment load, and the total number of people. BIM can automatically take the temperature of the dry & wet bulb and humidity by specifying the location of the buildings. When the essential heating and cooling loads are recognized, the desired ducting can be designed. Usually, the duct design is a hectic job with the sizing of the duct at different areas for delivering desired conditioning.

However, BIM provides the duct sizing as per the calculated CFM & FPM, by entering the value of FPM and mechanically calculating frictional losses in the duct & varying FPM in the branch duct and providing the size of the branch duct.

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360 Degree Visualization with 3D BIM, Communicating Design Intent All engineering components of the buildings along with structural and architectural ones can be visualized with BIM in 360 degrees in a different spectrum like the wireframe and rendered. You can get the walkthrough of the

entire building along with the Mechanical (HVAC), Plumbing and Electrical, Structural & Architectural components for detecting the building clashes concerning the services and between the services. The BIM model can be imported to the NavisWorks - another plug-in for Revit to perform clash detection and generate clash report for the entire building at once. A complete HVAC design of a building can simplify the visual understanding of the duct network and its crucial components. 

Construction Sequencing with 4D BIM Model for Optimized Operation Construction scheduling with 4D BIM facilitates in estimating the time for the installation of AC service for the project from designing, testing to commissioning when the BIM Model is fed with information about the activities of the work to be done. BIM can easily calculate the non-working days automatically based on calendar days. The report can be plugged-in in NavisWorks and the work schedule to be executed can be prepared.

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Accurate Cost Estimation with 5D BIM, Enabling Sustainable Construction The BIM model can store a lot of information for execution but the most essential one is budgeting. To estimate the project budget, the 5D BIM cost estimation has to be made in an accurate way for the selected materials and products. This generates the cost of the desired building system for the piping and ducting.

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Thermal Performance of the Building with 6D BIM, Reducing Energy Consumption The 6th dimension presents the data about the thermal performance of the building. In a conventional air-conditioned building, the AC system usually consumes the maximum power. Hence by taking a bit of care, you can reduce energy consumption, leading to substantial savings in the long run. The primary objective of the building energy simulation is to gauge the monthly & annual energy consumption of the HVAC system in terms of the thermal comfort as well as indoor air quality.

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Operation & Maintenance with 7D BIM, Optimizing Asset Management Another important dimension is how the BIM Model can play a vital role in maintaining the HVAC system of the building using ARCHIBUS & Autodesk technology. Through ARCHIBUS-Revit integration, one can certainly maintain and retrieve information about HVAC together with electrical components, such as electrical circuits, panels, lighting, control systems, receptacles, and more.

ARCHIBUS can create a comprehensive electrical inventory of the HVAC systems of the facility with pre-defined module standards with key information like the Model number, heat load, power requirements, and vendor information. You

can check the circuit & panel loads and calculate the floor, building, and room from the built-in report system. Further, overloaded circuits and other probable glitches can be prevented during the operation level. 

Mapping HVAC Parameters with Revit BIM Model A Revit model contains a wide array of equipment from categories like mechanical, electrical, and much more. Individual equipment asset contains a substantial amount of parametric data built in its system. Smart Client extension of Revit is designed for mapping and capturing data through a synchronization process whereas Revit parameters can be mapped to ARCHIBUS fields. The process can be executed by a BIM specialist much ahead of time in a planned way to capture FM appropriate data and ensure the proper use of the system.

The Crux of the Matter: Communication can be made easy through the mobile phone, transforming the phase of technology. Similarly, transformation can be seen in the project production while using the BIM collaborative process, providing a framework for the stakeholders’ interaction with the drive of streamlining administration, enhancing design, setting up data-transfer guidelines, and increasing quality while reducing the cost of project production. To know more about BIM Services for your projects, call the BIM Modelers of Tejjy Inc. at 202-465-4830 or info@tejjy.com.