Bi-Directional interoperability assessment and improvements for Structural Models with BIM Platforms through an automated Visual Programming Process

AEC projects are characterized to produce a large amount of data, being therefore the data management, a big challenge for the construction industry; however, the BIM has emerged as a methodological solution aimed to integrate design, modeling, construction and maintenance technical information that is exchanged in a coordinated way among all the construction project participants, increasing in this way the projects’ efficiency reflected in the optimization of technical solutions, cost and resource savings, shorter project lifecycles, improved interdisciplinary collaboration with the creation of single data models/databases and improved construction planning processes, leading altogether to higher quality results; nevertheless, the BIM methodology is still under development and implementation. The structural engineering field necessary for the development of construction projects’ structural analysis and designs is considered as backward in terms of BIM methodology implementation; in fact, the main reason regards the complex calculus models, analysis and calculation reports derived from the use of mathematical FEM models. This study focuses on the interoperability processes current state assessment between FEM-based structural analysis software and BIM Platforms Software that depending upon the weak points observed, it is presented the feasibility of a workflow based on Visual Programming Language (VPL) devoted to amplify interoperability operations for structural analysis by overcoming some actual issues. In the first part, a benchmarking process evaluation supported by a multicriteria analysis and strategic assessment (MCA) of the current state of the information exchange between eight commercial structural analysis software contemplating additional aspects such as software performance, capability, databases and economical information, is aimed for the selection of five structural analysis software in order to carry out a deeper assessment focused on software functionalities and exchange of structural information with the Revit BIM Software by means of an existing Revit Architectural Model of the Italia 61’ Turin Metro Station. The exchange of the structural information is performed through both a direct link/proprietary file and a neutral file format integration, identifying at the end through an MCA, the current interoperability processes weak points, especially for the ETABS- Revit integration. The results of this study show that the implementation of the VPL as an easily handled programming technique, by exploiting the advantages of applications such as the Autodesk Dynamo, permits the automation and amplification of the bi-directional structural analysis information exchange performance between ETABS and Revit usually executed through the CSiXRevit Plug-in, with the creation of specific visual program algorithms elaborated and tested in the present study case model base that is considered as good enough to cover many of the interoperability possible drawbacks for structural analysis.