Investigation of IFC file format for BIM based automated code compliance checking

Abstract

In the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry, a large number of laws and regulations define the technical features and standard requirements of a building. Checking the suitability of the building according to the rules in the building legislation is a human-oriented manual process that is largely based on 2D drawings. Therefore, this process is cumbersome, time consuming and error prone. Today, the use of Building Information Modeling (BIM) in the AEC sector continues to increase day by day. In a BIM-based construction project, digital models with 3D geometric and semantic information describe the building to be built extensively. This digital database prepared for the building can also be used to improve and partially automate the code compliance checking process. For this purpose, this data is exported with the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) file format, and this IFC file format provides an excellent opportunity to automate the process of checking compliance. In this study, the IFC file format, which allows BIM-based buildings' automatic code compliance checking to be performed is examined, and the meanings of the codes in the IFC file of the sample building model are examined in detail by matching them with the model. In addition, it is explained how to filter the data of the building model required for conducting conformity control from the IFC file. It is also shown how to check the compliance of storey height values of the sample building model designed within the scope of the application according to the relevant regulation rules. As a result of the examinations, data that would automatically ensure code compliance checking can be obtained from the IFC file format and the relationship of the IFC file structure with automatic code compliance checking has been revealed.

Process model for international building permit benchmarking and a validation example using the Israeli building permit process

“…Interviewees mentioned this inconsistency for example between the regulations of all the involved stakeholders to the guidelines and policies of the municipality Table 1. Challenges identified from the interviews Building permit process benchmarking automated code compliance checking (such as (Han et al, 1997;Pauwels et al, 2011;Dimyadi and Amor, 2013;Malsane et al, 2015;Preidel and Borrmann, 2016;Zhou and El-Gohary, 2016;Macit Ilal and Gunaydin, 2017;Kim et al, 2019;Temel and Basaga, 2020;Guo et al, 2021;_ Ilal and _ Ilal, 2022;Zhou et al, 2022;). Even when considering that code checking is an important part, it is just one step within the entire building permit process focusing only on a part of the content check within the review.…”

“…, 2015; Preidel and Borrmann, 2016; Zhou and El-Gohary, 2016; Macit Ilal and Gunaydin, 2017; Kim et al. , 2019; Temel and Basaga, 2020; Guo et al ., 2021; İlal and İlal, 2022; Zhou et al. , 2022; Bloch et al.…”

The Development of an Automated System for a Quality Evaluation of Engineering BIM Models: A Case Study

“…They tried to connect IFC data and neural network algorithms to construction quality evaluations to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the assessment. Temel and Basaga [36] used the IFC file format to automate checking compliance.…”

An Inspection of IFC Models from Practice

“…A number of different analyses are required to check a design against relevant regulations (e.g., building codes and city ordinances), and the BIM provided as a set of IFC files is likely to be processed by different tools to check them. For this reason, a comprehensive good quality of the models is essential [30,[44][45][46][47]. Entities have to be correctly identified by IFC classes; grouped consistently as IfcSite, IfcBuilding, IfcBuildingStoreys; their grouping as apartments or similar building units would also be appropriate; spaces should be modelled correctly, possibly with the association of functions or foreseen use, since many rules are based on such information, which is also hard to infer in an automated process.…”