Principles of BIM and PAS 1192-6 Copy

The most current definition of BIM says that “Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a set of modelling technologies and associated processes for creating, communicating and analysing information models”.

This quote has been taken from the BIM Handbook, which many BIM Managers call ‘The BIM Bible’.

In this quote, we can notice two things. First of all, BIM is only possible with a set of modelling technologies.

Some software might look like BIM software because they have the functionality of representing objects in 3D

Make no mistake – what really counts when checking whether you can use software for a BIM project is whether it allows you to produce, store and get information from objects in the model.

That is why we say that the ‘I’ in BIM is more important than the ‘M’

If we go back to the quote taken from the BIM Handbook we will see that BIM is also defined as the associated processes used to produce, store and share information with these technologies.

If you look up in the dictionary, a process is defined as “a series of actions or events performed to make something or achieve a particular result”.

In the UK this series of actions are described in standards.

Currently, there are 6 main standards for managing information in BIM-enabled projects.

These are the ISO 19650 series (including parts 1 to 5) and PAS 1192-6.

The development of these standards was based on an older series of standards known as the PAS 1192 series. The 1192 series were the first effort in the UK to standardise BIM processes.

In the old, PAS 1192 series language, BIM was divided into levels.

Level 0 means 2D paper-based unstructured data authoring, management and exchange;

Level 1 means structured data authoring, management and exchange in a CAD environment;

Level 2 means structured and collaborative data authoring, management and exchange in a BIM environment; and

Level 3 entails an enhanced structured data authoring, management and exchange in a fully collaborative platform enabled by Industry Foundation Classes (IFC).

When these series of standards were still current, the Government mandated the implementation of BIM Level 2 to all publicly funded projects in what is known as the BIM mandate.

However, these definitions were scraped in the new ISO 19650 series. Currently, government mandates “BIM according to ISO 19650”.

The standards not superseded by ISO 19650, like PAS 1192-6, can be applied depending on how people want to use BIM on the project.

For example, even when a project is being developed with BIM some clients might not want to use BIM for health and safety tasks in specific – and that is fine!

As we have seen, BIM can be used for many other things. We just need to remember to use the right technology and process for the task.

However, if we are indeed planning to use BIM for health and safety, then we need to look into more detail what PAS 1192-6 says, on top of implementing ISO 19650 on our project.

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