Integrated Precast Solutions: Improving Efficiency in Precast Fabrication Drawing approvals

Integrated Precast Solutions (IPS) Pte Ltd’s experience in Prefabricated Prefinished Volumetric Construction (PPVC), Prefabricated Bathroom Units (PBU), and other conventional precast products have made them one of the leaders in advanced precast concrete technology in Singapore, providing expertise and comprehensive services both as a precaster and consultant.

One of the challenges precast fabricators face is the drawing approvals stage. Typically, drawing revisions are tracked manually on an excel sheet, as individual BIM members will have their own copies of the drawing revisions, either stored on individual workstations, or on a shared server. The tracked revisions are then reconciled and updated to the Master Drawing List (MDL) for weekly or monthly reporting. This process is tedious and time-consuming, as revision numbers and dates have to be promptly updated whenever there are any modifications, as well as the approval status after the consultant reverts on the drawings. This has led to IPS implementing a more efficient system – a centralised BIM-based drawing approval system, with the help of Tekla Structures and Trimble Connect.

“With Tekla Structures and Trimble Connect, drawings are in sync, which means that if we amend in one model, it impacts change on other related drawings. This has greatly helped to reduce the time required for revisions.” — Wong Chun Siang, Asst Manager (Technical and Project Management), Integrated Precast Solution

The Benefits

The team at IPS has realised many benefits since moving toward a BIM-based drawing approval system. The foremost is in the time saved in having to track, maintain and duplicate revisions and approval status records to the Master Drawing List (MDL), which is now an automated process. This also reduces the potential for errors. The team has reported time-savings of up to 25%. Security has also been improved, as accessibility to the drawings can be better controlled, with access rights for each user depending on the hierarchy of use. This BIM-based drawing approval system is also fully digital, allowing a paperless process throughout, with no more passing of documents from one department to another.

But the most valuable benefit has been the improved collaborative process. By having a centralised system where drawings are kept on Trimble Connect – a cloud-based Common Data Environment (CDE) and collaboration platform – the IPS team has removed the difficulty of keeping the numerous stakeholders involved in a project updated at all times – with clear visibility and transparency for each stakeholder on the latest revisions and comments made to the drawings throughout the approval process. One other benefit of a centralised cloud-based system is no longer having to worry about the potential loss of time and cost to recover drawings in the conventional way of hard-copy local storage.

“Drawing approvals are typically timeconsuming, with the potential for errors and miscommunication amongst the various stakeholders on a project. Moving to a centralised BIM-based approval system has made a huge difference for us.”
— Kevin Soh, Director Integrated Precast Solution