A Research On The BIM-based Tower Crane Layout Planning

The planning and layout design of tower crane is a common construction technical problem,which is considered to be a complex combination problem,and has a long-term impact on the construction cost and construction schedule.Previous studies have focused how to use mathematical methods or visual tools to find the ideal tower crane layout.However,all of them need design personnel input and calculate of a large number of data manually,which is very time-consuming.Also,in these methods,it can be difficult for designers or managers to fully consider all of the restrictions in the process of tower crane layout planning.And it is not easy for site personal to understand the tower crane layout scheme of the poor,and not particularly practical.Therefore,some experience and knowledge about the tower crane layout planning needs to be formally expressed,and effective methods and tools should be used to provide effective support to solve the positioning and layout problems of the tower crane.This research is based on the “BIM technology and tower crane layout planning” theory framework.In this paper,the overseas and domestic research status about the tower crane layout planning has been discussed.Relevant theories and specifications of tower crane layout planning also has been sorted out,including four key factors that should be considered when selecting the tower crane,and principles that should be followed from the installation to removal of the tower crane.Besides,this paper points out several characteristics of BIM technology which is applicable to the tower crane layout planning and the application value of BIM.The purpose of this paper is to develop a BIM tower crane layout planning system using building information modeling(BIM)and firefly algorithm(FA).This system is made up of four modules: BIM modeling,mathematical modeling,model solution and simulation.Firstly,BIM technology,which acted as an information storage and project model building platform,is used to provide data as the input of the mathematical model.Secondly,taking “the minimum of the tower crane transport time and cost” as the objective function and according to of the relationship among each parameter in the mathematical model,to preliminary determine the optimal result of each tower crane layout scheme through the improved firefly algorithm.Thirdly,the optimal tower crane arrangement scheme is determined by contrasting objective function values of them.In this process,visualizing the output of the firefly algorithm through the BIM platform to determine whether space conflicts exist,and then to select whether remove or retain the result.So as to determine the optimal result of each layout scheme.Finally,this paper chooses a case of a hotel expansion project,which will only use one single tower crane,to demonstrate the proposed method and prove the practical value of this method.