By / Jessica Kirby

BuildCentrix (BCX) has developed a solution to one of its clients’ most important pain points—sorting through large volumes of data when working on a large, complicated project.  

“We’ve always wanted a solution for that,” says James Beveridge, CEO at BCX. “Looking at BCX’s client models, they can be too massive and complicated to work in while viewing the entire model.”

The solution lives in BCX’s Revit plugin. Revit is fundamentally a great visualization tool, but it can be hard to quickly and simply find the data required to work in a specific area. Packages, a new feature from BCX, will connect everyone from the office to installation back to the model while simplifying the workflow and addressing this challenge.

“The challenge our market has with Revit is getting to the data and the data consistency,” Beveridge says. “We can help with that. With this update, we have added the ability to create Packages using the Revit plug in, which then creates the Model>Packages>Order hierarchy.”

Packages allow users to go into the model and select and isolate one area of a big project at a time so they can focus on the work required in that segment. Different Packages could encompass a floor or a specific area or even just a system, and users can make orders associated with each Package.

“The purpose is to simplify the view and workflow,” Beveridge says. “So, the user can highlight a certain floor or area and select ‘Create a Package’. Once that is done, the Package can tie back to the model spooling IU within BCX, and the user can also simply  list and view the Packages that have been created.”

This solves the information gap and helps users only view information relevant to their current work.

“If I am working in BCX, I don’t have time to fully model the building,” Beveridge says. “I am going to focus on where my team will start, so I can make one Package for the first floor and one for the second and so on.”

Packages list where the segment comes from and when it was created, and the same is true when making takeoffs associated to Packages. “This is impactful because it simplifies how the field team engages with a massive model,” Beveridge says. “People in the office can segment the model and field teams can order for segments for a smoother workflow. Packages are a glove fit for simplifying that process.”

Looking ahead to next year, the BCX team is considering creating functionality similar to Packages that would grant the ability to push something from the CAM plugin into Revit, or adopting some different workflows across plugins.

BCX will also look to drive further adoption of model spooling because it gets the VDC department more engaged in the overall process by tying the project data back to the model using push and pull statuses.

“Push and pull statuses will update the model within BCX,” Beveridge says. “The user still has full functionality but can bypass model spooling and push something through if necessary.”

Another project in the works is automating spool sheet creation. “Users working in Revit must manually create spools, and in doing so, they make spool sheets that contain the data on the section of the model and send that and the .maj file to the shop,” Beveridge says. “We are working on automating the spool sheet creation and are getting pretty close on that.” ♣