It’s taught a lot more than it used to be and it’s very much dependent on which university you go to.

Ultimately, the construction industry needs to find a balance between prescription and innovation.Lamont believes we need BIM 19650 in terms of language and connectivity to ensure we’re getting the consistency of outcome we require.

However, he doesn’t think BIM on its own is going to save the day in terms of driving industry change.He says both prescription and innovation have a role to play.With respect to 19650 and UK standards, he says there’s a recognition in Australia that some kind of standard is needed to meet the requirement, but currently people are doing a little bit of their own thing.

This is creating confusion surrounding outputs in terms of what people are receiving and why.Currently, after designers create the concept design (including testing related to the engineering), things get handed over to the contractors to de-risk the program, make changes, and make the design work for them.

They then deliver what’s left back to the client.

Lamont doesn’t believe it’s necessarily the best process.. On the other side of things, there are governments trying to lead the path to innovation.Doing this allows us to combine efficiency of performance with economies of scale on buying, for example, larger quantities of single gauge of pipe.. For ease of installation, we use pre-wired electrical products wherever possible.

Fan and pipe modules are fabricated off-site, designed for simple connection on site.. We pre-cast a pattern of fixing points into the soffit, so that there would be no drilling into the soffit onsite – avoiding working at height, dirt, noise and the risk of drilling into the steel rebar within the concrete.The pattern of the fixing points caters to full range of M&E service elements, according to size and purpose: some are attached to unistrut, some are on frames or drop rods, and some are fixed directly to the soffit.

But in order to keep fixings and supports to a minimum, fixing requirements for all M&E services are considered in coordination and designed to be shared between modules / equipment.They are also pre-attached offsite wherever possible, ready to fix to the pre-cast points.. Pre-assembled pipe modules massively reduce the amount of working at height required.