BIM 360 Clash Detection - Anybody actually using it despite the performance problems?

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

BIM 360 is unable to show the whole model of the Hospital sample project from Autodesk. This is obviously problematic since we have much MUCH larger projects in real life and BIM 360 cannot handle this size of building.

As expected, when I run clash detection with the Hospital sample building, BIM 360 chokes and in unable to show me the list of clashes. Looking at the tutorial, it seems like people have split the model to only contain one floor at a time in order to accommodate BIM 360 weakness with large models. This is not an acceptable solution as we have 40+ building and there's no way we're about to manage 40 times more models.

It's also tricky to perfectly split the model by 3D views, especially with a large team collaborating. There's the problem of constant quality control and especially quality control on the models of collaborating engineers. If people are splitting by level, are you using filters, section boxes or other methods? How do you make this process not-error prone and extremely painful? I feel like I'm missing a crucial piece of the puzzle.

It also seems super problematic to have to wait many hours after uploading a model to BIM 360 until you are able to review the clashes. Like, what if there's an error, the meeting is adjourned until the week after?

[Yien_Chao]

To answer some of your questions...
We use model coordination in Bim360 (before we used our own addin, and before that Naviswork),  but keep in mind that primary and critical coordinations are always done manually on a set of plans. The module in bim360 or Naviswork is just for double checking. Never rely on clash detection to do your coordination job which is much more complex than simple interference.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

Hi Yien,

I'm more confused about the performance aspect, specifically how people split the model into smaller chunks that BIM360 can handle (it can't handle much!)

Are people:

1-Splitting their models by floors in Revit? (that sounds absolutely insane)

2-Using some way to split the model by floor in BIM 360 without really splitting the Revit model? I've not found any documentation or workflow video to suggest this

3-Just using Navisworks because BIM 360 can't handle any big buildings and I'm wasting my time trying to use BIM 360 coordination on a real sized building

I'm hoping the answer is #2 and I just have not found the right documentation/video yet

[Yien_Chao]

Hi Samuel,

yes the performance is indeed not 100% optimal. Separate the models? By zone or floor it is done well, but you need a 3d view for each separation. Personally I prefer to see the whole building and I save views with only the files required for a particular simulation, eg architecture and ventilation. If there is a possible clash, I pass it on to the responsible people who must coordinate it with the other disciplines. The sets of plans are the last point of coordination.

This may sound slow, but people tend to think interference detection can replace actual coordination by professionals. In fact, if the coordination is well done, there is very little clash afterwards.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

I did get a bit of a hint that it was possible to clash one 3D view against another, I guess I have to keep poking to figure out how this is done. It's quite an imperfect solution that could be prone to imperfect splitting, but it would kind of solve the performance issues.

[thomas.taggart]

The trick is to learn to manipulate the use of coordination spaces and saved views. Use a coordination space as the main federation tool for a zone.

For detailed analysis break the info down using the B360 Model Coordination  "saved views".  Here you save multiple exported Revit views together. (yes, you clash views) Remember the coordination module uses the views from your Revit model - not the model per say, it converts them to SVF as far as I can tell.

The concept is federated 360 views focusing on different aspects of the design and pulling info from one place (the coordination space). Then using different portals (360 & NW for now) to access that info, understanding what tasks they are useful for. 

I mentioned NW - 

Access the saved 360 Model Coordination views directly via NW (NW 360 issues app). It has access to the coordination spaces and associated views. The converted Revit views are SVF and NW can still dig into that info via search sets. Note: I have had an issue with the search sets remaining "set" - too much for here.

The direction (for now) appears to be replacing search sets with authoring software 3d views. For MEP we have easily broken our models down to a set of 3d views that we federate on B360 and feed to NW.

It has been worth it.

NW is a better clash coordination tool, but it can be a "barometer" of  problem areas at which point B360 Model Coordination is used to analyze and track problems via B360 issues.

B360 Model Coordination runs well if focused and controlled.

We don't use NWC files. I  set auto publish for design team models and update the coordination spaces which in turn update the views.. which in turn updates NW, ….updating all clash tests (360 & NW) - You get the idea.

I feel NW is losing its grip as model federation forerunner. But its early days. 

And yes, we do run the entire site thru 360 and open in NW - it can take a while - but it works. 

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

Thanks! This is exactly what I was looking for.

Have you found a smart way to divide the views? The two options I can think of are both imperfect:

-Using a section box

-Filtering by level (seemingly more problematic)

Also, have you found a good tutorial that goes over this workflow? When I looked online in the documentation and on Autodesk University,  it did not really show "How the sausage is made".

[thomas.taggart]

splitting views by services should always be automated (filters - never worksets) - so yes.

Splitting by level/ area would be section boxes. - should work ok?

A strong set of view templates combined with section box control has worked well.

The process I describe has been "made up" on a live project. It has been through a lot of trial and error to get it to the explanation here, desktop connector management, linking models; not workshared, not initiated,  nested linking, models from diff hubs, Civils 3d CAD, Coord spaces jamming... right down to the geometry a B360 issue associates to and how it propagates thru coordination spaces and views -  to name a few.

Certainly this way of thinking is becoming common with the changes in technology. I don't think you'll find a tutorial but you may find a presentation.

I'm aiming to present this as a case study.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

Ok, so I've been doing these tests in the background of my regular work and I think I finally figured out how this is supposed to work. Really disappointing that there are not better explanations online.

1-Create a model just for coordination, place it in a new folder. Mark this folder as a Clash Coordination Space. Link all other models into this coordination model. Turn off all relevant worksets from the link, ensure phase filter have the same name and properties in all linked files. Synch all phases between linked models.

2-Create an axonometric view for each level in Revit. This is actually more annoying and hard than it should be because section boxes do not snap to anything in Revit. To get consistent results, I used the "Align to 2D view" method, which is already one of my favorite ways to make 3d views.

At first, I made a plan view for each level and gave it the following View Range properties:

Top = level above, offset = 0

Bottom = Associated level, Offset = 0

View Depth = Associated level, Offset = 0

Then I went in the 3d view, right clicked the navigation cube and select "Orient to View > Floor Plan > select this floor plan"

That did not work well. It basically seems to give it an offset and not truly cut at the exact level. For example, I would still see a sliver of all walls that are on the level above. To fix this, I adjusted the properties of the plan:

Top = level above, offset = -5

Bottom = Associated level, Offset = -5

View Depth = Associated level, Offset = -5

Than I redid the "Orient to View > Floor Plan > select this floor plan" operation. This fixed the imprecise cutting of the section boxes in 3D. Basically, there is a lot of improvement required in this workflow if you expect us to get accurate and reproducible 3D section boxes in Revit, like allowing us to snap our section boxes, making the "Align to 2D view actually accurate to the original view" and letting users scroll through the list of 2D (it's a super long list sometimes and navigating it can be extremely frustrating since here is no scroll bar, just an arrow you have to hold to go down the list)

2-Once you have a perfect 3D view for each floor, duplicate for each and isolate one of the linked models on each floor. I basically ended up with the following lists:

Clash-1-All

Clash-1-ARCH

Clash-1-ELECT

Clash-1-FIRE

Clash-1-MECH

Clash-1-PLUMB

Clash-1-SPRINKLER

Clash-1-STRUCT

Clash-2-All

... etc, on and on

Add all these views to a published Set of views. Synchronize the model and publish these views to the cloud. It will take many hours to be ready on BIM 360, especially since it will not conduct clashes between all these views.

When it is processed, go to your BIM 360 project, go to "Model Coordination" and "Models".

Start creating your views. To create view "1-ARCH-MECH" that will compare both architectural and mechanical, select the two related models "Clash-1-ARCH" and "Clash-1-MECH" from the list of models on the "Models" page, then click "View" at the top. This will load both models. Once it is done, select "Save view" and name the view "1-ARCH-MECH". Make this view public, not private. Doing this for each view takes a really long time and seems like it could be automated...

Do this for all views.

-

I will keep playing and updating this if I can figure out more about the workflow. In the meantime, I think this can be a good guide as the "missing manual" to how this actually works. Hope this is helpful.

The workflow is quite slow and imperfect. Will hopefully advise about all the shortcoming and tips I can find when I am done testing.

[bcallU58HA]

Try using scope boxes for each of your phases/levels. Then you can just select them from the drop-down and it will section it perfectly for you each time.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

That is a worse solution that workaround I proposed, because scope boxes don't snap and therefore have no accuracy.

[collinsrevit]

I have a similar issue as you can see the heat pump clearly passes through the sump tank but the clash detection on Autodesk construction cloud doesn't recognize the clash. It's bizzare. Any inputs? 

[Chad-Smith]

I don't know if I have any solutions, but here is my experience to date. Note, I don't work on massive multi-storey projects, but have worked on larger footprint projects under 10 storeys.

• Unless Revit can't handle it, I wouldn't split a model into multiple files just to suit BIM 360.
• As mentioned in this post, creating level views is a better approach. However, setting up all those views with the sectioning is a royal pain. This gets even worse when expecting all consultants to do the same and in the exact same way.
• You might find it more favourable to not split by every level, but maybe level groupings. Levels 0-9, 10-19, etc.
• I have become more comfortable with using the BIM 360 viewer Levels panel. It's not perfect, but it does have some automated behaviour to hide horizontal elements so you can see services. I actually prefer this over creating Revit level Views. And you may find this preferable when used with level grouping from the above point.
• From a navigation performance perspective, I generally do not have any issues, other than larger models take a little longer to load. But I do have a higher performing laptop, with plenty of RAM.
• But, a couple of other feature issues that I have faced:
  • Be aware of the Clash Group Limit. I've hit this on projects as small as a single storey. Once you do, your ability to use Model Coordination clashes comes to an end. This is a show-stopping limitation that really needs to be addressed. Especially when one of the promoted features is to group and close non-issues, which accounts for many clash groups.
    The newer released feature of excluding models not required for clashing will help a little to clean up the clash matrix. These are models that don't need clashing, but you still require them for federated viewing.
  • The larger your individual models, and therefore the larger the clashes list when viewing models, the slower the performance of Model Coordination when closing them out as non-issues or assigning them to users. You can only select 1000 clashes at a time, and if you are viewing results over say 10,000 clashes, there is a lot of selection lag. This gets exponentially worse with more clash results.

[Chad-Smith]

---

@collinsrevit wrote:

I have a similar issue as you can see the heat pump clearly passes through the sump tank but the clash detection on Autodesk construction cloud doesn't recognize the clash. It's bizzare. Any inputs? 

---

There is a known limitation that returning clashes are not re-identified in Model Coordination. This could be the case here.

e.g.

• A clash exists.
• It's assigned to a user as a clash.
• The clash is resolved in Revit, and a new versioned shared.
• Model Coordination understands that the issue is resolved.
• But at a later stage due to a design change the clash between these previously resolved elements re-clashes.
• Model Coordination won't re-identify the clash.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

Seems like Autodesk is serving up a product that does not really work to do its intended purpose: Finding, categorizing and resolving clashes.

• It does not provide a way to split levels, instead making users go through multiple hours of manual setup which may be impossible to coordinate with other disciplines.
• It does not resolve clones of clashes already identified.
• It has a showstopper limit on the number of clashes.

I've recently analyzed Navisworks and found some similar glaring limitations:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/navisworks-forum/revit-level-data-is-wrong-can-i-still-check-by-level...

Seems like AD needs to dogfood it's own products since the can't properly do their main purposes/functions.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

@Chad-Smith 

"I have become more comfortable with using the BIM 360 viewer Levels panel. It's not perfect, but it does have some automated behaviour to hide horizontal elements so you can see services. I actually prefer this over creating Revit level Views. And you may find this preferable when used with level grouping from the above point."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I did not find a way to create a new 3D view in BIM 360 (for example, level one architecture only) and then use that view for clashing in BIM 360.

[RSomppi]

Product feedback is elsewhere.

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

I will happily take a product solution if it exists

[Chad-Smith]

@Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard Sorry for my bad use of terms. By Revit level View, I was referring to the creation of level-to-level 3D views in Revit itself, as discussed previously in this thread. You can't create your own views in BIM 360, but I really wish we could.

While I appreciate some of the ways that BIM 360 works and integrates with Revit, I still find the overall process clumsy. As a project VDC Manager, I should at least have some level of control on how the models/views are prepared. So there are many smaller features/tools that I would like.

• As you say, creating new 3D views is the most obvious. Especially between levels.
• I need some control of element visibility, such as Detail Level (particularly for services), Worksets, and Links (that are accidentally left on). I am forever telling the model authors to set these correctly.
• Overriding view names so they are consistent. BIM 360 has file naming standards, but not for views.
• And lastly, being able to completely remove certain models and views from the entire clash process.

I will add the below Idea I made this year about consolidating for a better user experience. In it I did a mock screenshot that adds Views to the tabbed menu. This is for creating new views, but I would also see this working in with clashes. There are far too many disconnected modules in BIM 360 for the overall design process.

It's time to consolidate Docs + Design Collaboration + Model Coordination - Autodesk Community

[marketingXEHG4]

We’ve had similar experiences. BIM 360’s clash detection is useful, but once you get into larger projects, the performance really struggles. Splitting models by level or zone technically works, but it adds a lot of manual setup and QA overhead. 

I'm working in a BIM Company(eracore.com) and we’ve had to rely on Navisworks for the actual heavy clash detection, while using BIM 360 more as a review/communication space. It would be great to hear if anyone has found a way to keep everything inside BIM 360 without the workarounds.