Smart Facility Management System Based on Open BIM and Augmented Reality Technology

• Published in: Applied sciences 2021-11, Vol.11 (21), p.10283
• Main Authors: Chung, Suwan, Cho, Chung-Suk, Song, Jinwoo, Lee, Kyuhyup, Lee, Seojoon, Kwon, Soonwook
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Augmented reality; augmented reality (AR); Automation; Building information modeling; building information modeling (BIM); Building management systems; Construction industry; Construction management; Data exchange; Data models; Design; Facilities management; facility management (FM); Information dissemination; Information management; Literature reviews; mobile application; Onsite; Technology; Visualization
• ISSN: 2076-3417; 2076-3417
• DOI: 10.3390/app112110283

With the wave of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the construction industry is also witnessing the application of numerous state-of-the-art technologies. Among these, augmented reality (AR) technology has the advantage of utilizing existing 3D models and BIM data and is thus an area of active research. However, the main area of research to date has either been in visualizing information during the design phase, where architects and project stakeholders can share viewings, or in confirming the required information for construction management through visualization during the construction phase. As such, more research is required in the application of AR during the facility management (FM) phase. Research utilizing BIM in the FM phase, which constitutes the longest period during the lifecycle of a building, has been continuously carried out but has faced challenges with regard to on-site application. The reason for this is that information required for BIM during the design, construction and FM phases is different, and the reproduced information is vast, so identifying the required BIM data for FM and interfacing with other systems is difficult. As a measure to overcome this limitation, advanced countries such as the US and UK have developed and are using Construction Operations Building information exchange (COBie), which is an open-source BIM-based information exchange system. In order to effectively convert open-source BIM data to AR data, this research defined COBie data for windows and doors, converted them to a system and validated that it could actually be applied for on-site FM. The results of this system’s creation and validation showed that the proposed AR-based smart FMS demonstrated faster and easier access to information compared with existing 2D blueprint-based FM work, while information obtained through AR allowed for immediate, more visual and easier means to express the information when integrated with actual objects.