Synchro Pro

Synchro PRO is an advanced software that allows to work in real time with 4D functionality, to plan, manage and communicate the projects. With this program it is possible to do many interesting things for example compare two different scenarios (what-if: comperes two situation, like planned date and actual date) using the base lines schedules or add the cost parameter. A very positive aspect is that support a big number of files from different sources. It can be used as a “door” for the Facility Management of the project.

For this thesis, it was used in an attempt to obtain a better representation of the maintenance program sequence and prove the interoperability with Tekla Structures.

Previous steps on Tekla

The advantage of having worked the 4D model previously on Tekla, was the chronoprogram is already done and it was just necessary export it in the correct format (Microsoft Project XML file). To import the IFC file that contains the elements which will

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powerful command, Organizer, that Tekla provides to managing model information.

By using Organizer, a category named Maintenance Phases and several subcategories were created, each of them represents the phases in which the model was earlier divided. Because of that, the element selection did not claim much time. In the Organizer windows it is possible to see the properties (profile, material, height, phase, length, UDA, etc.) of the objects belonging to the subcategory selected.

The objective for which the subcategories were created based on the maintenance phases, was to insert them a Zone Code. This code represents the divisions of the model according the parts and their location. The Zone Code was inserted as user defined attribute through a property category, consequently it was possible to export the code with the objects in IFC file.

It is important to say, the code is just visible in the Organizer window, to see it in the User defined Attributes dialog box it is necessary to add it in the objetcs.inp file. The next step was to add the custom property (zone code) in the category property. Then it was possible to set the zone code value for each subcategory.

Figure 5.61- Category Properties window, insertion of the created parameter

To write the values to the model objects it was executed the Synchronize category button. The last step was to add the classification code to the project properties: Project Properties > Attributes > User-Defined attributes > Classification system (it was written the name of the code created: Zone Code), this made the attribute visible on the Export setting. As explained in the section 4.5, it was created a Property Set Configuration where was only selected the properties needed for the maintenance plan implementation in Synchro Pro, such as: Name, Profile, Zone Code, IfcType, Material, Phase and so on.

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Use of Synchro

Once the IFC file and the XML file were exported, it was executed the importation in Synchro. The XML file was imported smoothly, by contrast the IFC format required a little intervention because the IfcReinforcement and IfcRebar elements were displayed as very long lines. To fix this problem, the author decided to delete these types of elements due to are not necessary for the maintenance control. The elements imported are showed as Resource.

Figure 5.62- Resources window (element imported)

The elements were linked to the associated task automatically by using an automatching command named: Perform Resource to Task Automatching. This command allows to use parameters or customer field to link the 3D model with the schedule. To use this process, a custom column with the zone code had to be created on the resources, and also added a column with this parameter to the tasks. It was necessary to assign the code corresponding to each task. After that, it was possible to create the rule with the expression to match the elements with the tasks.

The software searches the objects according this code and added them to the activity that has the same code value. It is possible to see what elements have been assigned to each task.

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Figure 5.63- Rule created for the link

Finally, to carry out the simulation, the options Maintenance was chosen as appearance profile. (Other options are Install for the erection, Temporary and Remove for the demolition). For the simulation it was possible to define the camera position, as well as, the scale of time that represent a second in the different schedule parts. As mentioned, the software has a great potential for the model management, here it was just applied for a little demonstration.

Figure 5.64-Fragment of the simulation: day 10/03/2021

Compared with the Tekla simulation, Synchro shows in conjunction with the video the progress on the Gantt chart which allow to have a clear interpretation of the development of the maintenance plan.

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Figure 5.65- Video Synchro PRO maintenance plan simulation

Figure 5.66 - QR code of the video

The simulation of the maintenance plan obtained with Tekla Structures and Synchro PRO, it will be useful to program futures activities such as repairs, interventions or road closing and evaluate their impacts on the schedule. All this information will be valuable to take important decisions.

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