Structural analysis of Supports Reactions by Using Building Information Modelling

Structural analysis is a key part of the engineering design that structural engineers use to ensure that a structure can resist the different types of forces that it will encounter during its operation. Many powerful and popular structural software are available in this engineering field. Building information modelling (BIM) is one of the most promising recent developments in the Engineering field. Employing BIM enhanced the building design process by introducing new avenues for collaboration among multi-disciplinary designers. Currently, different BIM software packages are used by the multidisciplinary designers. However, not much information can be found in the BIM model that structural engineers can benefit from. Moreover, the structural software programs have not adopted the philosophy of BIM on the framework of the software.The objective of this study is to use BIM technology for analysis of the building structural model. This study is limited to find the reactions of the supports, as a structural element, in the BIM model. Therefore, a new application “Support Reactions application” is implemented, which was created by using Microsoft C# programming language. This application was integrated and interfaced with Autodesk Revit by using the Revit API (Application programming interface). As a result, this new add-in makes its users free from using any other structural software to find the supports reactions in the BIM model.