Building Design and Operation
an efficiency benefit that will deliver tangible cost savings in the future, and we expect the mandatory use of BIM to make it easier for customers to choose products from our Symphony Doorset range.
TESTED, COMPLIANT COMPONENTS Essentially, we now have a set of tested, compliant components all designed to work together in challenging mental health environments. Our built-in specification checker will even let the customer know when they have combined components that will not work in harmony. To help further, we have a special BIM Symphony Doorsets CPD seminar and Revit, which means we can model the doors for customers and email these to them directly. Using our two fully-editable models – or ‘families’ as they are known – you can specify all elements of the Symphony Doorsets brochure – from closers, to Primera handles, and even our acoustic threshold seal. Just two door models are therefore required, not endless BIM modelling time to incorporate manufacturers’ items onto the standard BIM door blank, thus keeping the focus on designing great buildings, which is crucial in the mental health and wider health and social care sectors.
AUTOMATIC SCHEDULE CREATION With the fully specified door models, you can automatically create door and ironmongery schedules from the BIM project. This, in turn, will mean projects will eventually be able to be automatically priced using an online tool. The BIM model already calculates the clear opening width and height.
This active programming will prevent the creation of incompatible models. It will also enable architects and contractors to record their delivery partners – the company they may prefer to procure their doorsets from, or the person they have worked with to develop the specifications. For Safehinge, as a supplier to the healthcare market, we have identified numerous potential cost savings throughout the supply chain, and that is why we are so excited about our BIM models. We think they simplify the whole specification process, and demonstrate exactly how a building comes together.
SUPPLY CHAIN EFFICIENCIES Through the digitisation of the information in this way, we are enabling procurement and supply chain efficiencies throughout the construction phase, and leading into the operational phase. I believe this will lead to improved product feedback from customers for manufacturers. We have only launched our models within the past two weeks, but the initial response has been really good. They are allowing non- technical clients to get a quick, and more simplified, picture of what their doorset is going to look like. Do not just take our word for it, however. A survey by Autodesk found that the availability of BIM-compliant products and services made clients 80% more likely to choose a specific manufacturer’s product. Furthermore, the detailed designs produced
22 THE NETWORK J a n u a r y 2016
‘BIM4Health has been set up to help organisations to embrace and adopt BIM. It’s about creating a benchmark that everyone can understand’
made it 80% more likely that the products originally specified in the BIM drawings at the beginning of the process would actually be purchased further down the line. Despite this, research by UK Construction
Week and BRE shows that there is still a long way to go.
A LACK OF READINESS? Three-quarters of construction professionals do not believe the industry is ready to meet mandatory BIM requirements by the Government’s deadline, and nearly 71% of the non-manufacturing respondents believe suppliers are not moving quickly enough to provide BIM-ready information. This figure appears to be borne out by building product manufacturers, two-thirds of whom surveyed said their products are not yet available as BIM objects. While making the decision to have your products modelled in 3D does require some investment, choosing this option in advance of the 2016 deadline is essential if you wish to remain competitive in a rapidly changing business environment. At Safehinge we have recognised this, and, as one of the early adopters, have realised the benefits and will continue to develop our BIM model to enable the full advantages across the entire supply chain.
HELP AT HAND For those yet to make this leap, there is help at hand. Clients can visit the BIM page on our website –
www.safehinge.com/bim, or BIMstore to download the models and then load these ‘families’ into their own Revit project. An industry task force – BIM4Health –has also been set up to support businesses, and in particular healthcare manufacturers, to implement BIM for their own products. Group members include Janet Beckett from the
Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers (CIBSE); Cliff Jones from the Department of Health’s P21+ framework; Jonathan Stewart and Mark Holloway from the Health Estates and Facilities Management Association (HefmA); Dr Richard Pope from the Academic Health Science Network; Michael Dyson from NHS Property Services; Karl Redmond, BIM4SME representative and director of Bowman Riley Innovate, and David Kershaw, representative for P21+ and its principal supply chain partners. Steve Batson, BIM4Health chairman, and a director and trustee of IHEEM, explained: “In just a few months the Government is mandating the use of BIM on public-sector construction projects, including NHS schemes. It got to the point when we were getting a lot of enquiries from IHEEM members asking what they needed to do, and how they were supposed to do it. “BIM4Health has been set up to help organisations to embrace and adopt BIM. It’s about creating a benchmark that everyone can understand.”
RAISING AWARENESS Prior to the deadline for adoption, the group will raise awareness of BIM within the healthcare sector, articulate the value for all parties, provide a clear understanding of the government requirements for the initial BIM roll-out process, and assist with future stages. It will also provide a voice for manufacturers, reflecting their concerns and interests. David Kershaw said: “We are striving to provide simple tools for Trusts and businesses to help them understand what BIM means, and how it can help them. We don’t want to reinvent the wheel, so it’s about helping people start on the BIM journey.”
The main lesson we have learnt at Safehinge through this process is that there are many ways to skin a cat. Manufacturers need to think carefully about how they model their products – do they want static or editable models? They also need to ask what intelligence they can build in to eliminate specification errors, and what other supply chain efficiencies this new level of digital information can allow. The time to start doing something about BIM is now. It does not have to be daunting, and the rewards, we think, will be worth the effort. •
About the author and Safehinge
Philip Ross is a director of Safehinge – ‘a product design company with a heartfelt passion for finding innovative new ways of doing things’. In 2014 the company’s Symphony product was awarded ‘Product Innovation of the Year’ at the Design in Mental Health Network Awards, and ‘Best Product for Improving the Patient Experience’ at the Building Better Healthcare awards. Symphony is a fully coordinated doorset package for mental health. Launched in 2013, it has been rapidly adopted by Trusts across the UK. Safehinge says that ‘a number of revolutionary products have been developed since – from a collapsible anti-barricade stop, to the first anti-tamper acoustic threshold seal’. Philip Ross set up Safehinge with business partner, Martin Izod, in 2007. With a background in Product Design Engineering at the Glasgow School of Art, Martin Izod worked for design businesses internationally, before returning to the UK to incorporate Safehinge.
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