Building information modeling in timber construction - A solution for planning process, design phases and the unification of scope of works

The advancements of recently developed timber products and their application in construction demand standardization and unification of planning processes, design solutions and construction management. Within the planning sector and the timber industry, the call for an early integration of specific information referring to timber construction aspects increases constantly. To this end, implementing methods of an integral planning process such as Building Information Modeling (BIM) seems to be a feasible solution. The existing planning equipment and design tools, the data on building components and processing technologies offer great possibilities for the large-scale implementation of BIM in the timber industry. Today's planning methodology commonly used in construction is based on formal concepts with the successive integration of designers and experts following the construction sequences from general into detail. This traditional approach dictates the methods of today's construction design. However, the probability of information loss through a step by step planning phase is extremely high as the degree of information within a building's construction increases significantly. To be able to investigate the requirements and constraints for an integrated planning process in timber construction, an expert survey was conducted in 2016. According to the experts' opinions, the integration of consistent data and information workflow in the planning process enables a traceable and transparent planning process, precise cost estimation and increasing planning quality. Among others, these arguments are confirmed by the majority of existing surveys as well as direct expert consultancies. Following the expert survey, timber construction systems with a high percentage of prefabrication are considered to be ideal for the vast implementation of building information modeling and management. The identified criterion and surveyed fundamentals of industrialized serial building systems can be transferred into general planning management methods. Additionally, the applicability was analysed in order to determine the potentials to generate appropriate design systems for timber construction.