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Data from models and drawings

Your model knows more than your drawing shows.

A model is not a picture. In a BIM model every building element carries dimensions, material, storey and classification; a 3D CAD assembly already contains the entire bill of materials; the NC files of a steel structure hold the profile, length and holes of every position; and in a 2D drawing every block can be counted and every contour measured. After the design stage that data is usually left unused, while estimating, purchasing and work preparation enter the same information again by hand. HIDAIA extracts the data from the model and passes it on to the rest of your process.

Try it with your own model What you do with it afterwards
01 — Try it yourself

In your browser

From model or drawing to usable data.

Choose a building model (IFC), a 3D assembly (STEP), a 2D drawing (DXF) or the NC files of a steel structure (DSTV-NC1), and you get quantities, a bill of materials, counts or a cutting list. Do you only have a PDF? Then you set the scale and measure lengths and areas yourself.

The model does not leave your computer. Reading and calculating take place entirely in your browser. Nothing is uploaded and nothing is stored.

This software uses facilities of Open CASCADE Technology. They are used to read STEP files; IFC files are read with web-ifc; we read DXF and DSTV-NC1 with our own code; we display PDF drawings with pdf.js. Licences and source code.

or try an example

The examples are fictional and were made by us. Large models work best on a desktop or laptop; in Firefox a large STEP model takes noticeably longer. Save a DWG drawing as DXF in AutoCAD first.

02 — What is in a model

Rich data

What a model already knows.

It is already in there, because the designer needed it to design. If you extract it, you do not have to work it out again further down the line.

In a building model (IFC), per building element

Dimensions

Length, area and volume per wall, floor, roof, column and beam. Gross and net, with openings taken into account.

Material and build-up

Which material, and for composite constructions every layer with its thickness. From that follows the volume per material.

Place in the building

Which storey a building element is on, whether it is external or internal, load-bearing or not. The basis for phasing and ordering moments.

Classification

The NL-SfB code and the type. With these a building element connects to your own cost breakdown or article file.

In a 3D assembly (STEP), per part

Structure

Which parts are in which assembly, and how many times. Four wheel sets with four bolts each is sixteen bolts: the bill of materials works itself out.

Exact shape

Volume and surface area from the real geometry, not estimated. From that follow the weight per material and the surface area to be treated.

Dimensions

The bounding dimensions per part. A first indication for cutting length, sheet size or packaging.

Names

The part name or article number the designer assigned. With these the bill of materials connects to your ERP or purchasing list.

In a 2D drawing (DXF), per layer and per block

Blocks

Every repeated component that has been drawn as a block can be counted: columns, supports, doors, light fittings. How many times, and on which layer.

Attributes

What the designer attached to a block, such as type, height or make. With these the count splits out per variant.

Lengths and contours

The line length per layer and the area of every closed contour: metres of gutter, square metres of bay or floor.

Structure, not meaning

A drawing does not know that a block is a column. We record that translation with you once; after that every subsequent drawing counts itself.

In a PDF drawing: lines only

Exact lines

A PDF that comes from a drawing package contains the lines as vectors. Measuring points therefore snap to the real vertices, not to a pixel nearby.

Scale

The scale is often stated in the title block. Calibrating on one dimensioned line is more reliable: a PDF has not always been produced at true size.

Lengths and areas

You click the line or the area; the tool calculates metres and square metres and adds them up.

No layers, no objects

Everything the drawing package knew disappeared when the PDF was made. That is why this remains measuring, not counting. If you receive the model itself, it happens automatically.

In the NC files of a steel structure (DSTV-NC1), per position

Profile and grade

Which profile or which plate, in which steel grade. Added up per profile, that is the purchasing list.

Length and quantity

The length per piece and how many pieces. From that follow the cutting list and the total metres per profile.

Holes and operations

Every hole with its diameter and position. Counted per diameter, you know what has to be drilled or punched.

Weight and order

Weight per metre or per square metre, plus order, drawing and position number for the connection to your ERP.

03 — Check first

From practice

A model does not automatically add up correctly.

If you adopt quantities blindly, you adopt the errors too. That is why our reader recalculates every building element from its 3D shape and reports where model and shape contradict each other.

  1. Split floorsA floor that has been cut into four parts sometimes carries the area of the whole on each part. Without correction you count that floor four times.
  2. Roof and roof halvesA composite roof carries the same area as the sum of its components. Count both and the roof is in there twice.
  3. Wrong unitIn some exports the perimeter of a floor is given in feet instead of millimetres. We recognise that from its ratio to the area.
  4. Shape that does not closeIf a 3D shape is not closed, the calculated volume is unreliable. In that case we do not use it, and we say so.
  5. Drawing without a unit or without blocksA DXF does not always say in which unit it was drawn, and whatever sits on layer 0 as loose lines cannot be counted. The reader reports that, so it is clear what has to change in the drawing conventions first.
  6. Empty fields in NC filesNot every package fills in the header block completely. In public test files from three packages, the steel grade was missing in a quarter of them and the weight in a few. The reader calculates on where it can and reports what is missing.
  7. Flattened assemblyMany STEP exports contain the whole machine as a single body. In that case a bill of materials can no longer be extracted, only volume and dimensions. The reader reports that, so you can export again as an assembly.
04 — And then?

Further in your process

Quantities are the beginning, not the end.

The gain lies in what no longer has to be done by hand afterwards. Which step yields the most for you depends on how you work now.

  1. EstimatingEstimate based on real quantitiesBuilding elements linked to your own rules and norms, in the format of your estimating package.
  2. PurchasingOrder lists per materialVolumes and areas per material and per storey, ready for quotation requests and call-off.
  3. Work preparationPlanning per storeyWhat is needed per phase, derived from where it sits in the building.
  4. AccountabilityMaterials overviewOne list of what goes into the building, as a basis for reports on material use.
  5. DeliveryIn Excel or in the format of your packageAs a clear Excel file, or directly in the format of your estimating, ERP or planning package, so that nobody has to retype the data.

Where we stand now. The reader works with IFC (IFC2x3 and IFC4), tested on exports from Revit; with STEP (AP203, AP214 and AP242), tested on public test models up to 15 MB; with DSTV-NC1, tested on public test files from three packages; and with DXF (R12 up to and including 2018), for which the result on ten test drawings equals that of an independent library. On PDF drawings you measure yourself; on our example drawing with known dimensions the result matches to the millimetre. We have not yet tested STEP, NC1, DXF and PDF on files from day-to-day practice. That is exactly where the surprises are; we would be glad to read those together with you. We do not read DWG directly: save the drawing as DXF.