BIM modelling usually lands on our desk at the moment a drawing office is already at full capacity. There is a project with a tight schedule, your own drafters are tied up with ongoing work, and yet a model still has to be built from which floor plans, sections and details can be produced.
That is the point at which we get the call. We are an outsourced drafting team that takes over the modelling and drafting work, fully remotely from our own office and with our own licences.
We do not do engineering, we do not carry out calculations and we do not advise on structural design. What we do is model and draw, in high volumes and with a lot of repetition, exactly the kind of work an in-house team rarely manages to fit in on time. Everyone who works for us has more than ten years of CAD experience, and the core of the team brings together around twenty-five years of experience. Sam, our team leader, directs the work and remains your technical point of contact throughout the project.
Cable tray routing in the model, built with parametric families that carry the material schedule with them.
What we deliver in BIM modelling
In BIM modelling we deliver the model and everything that is derived from it. That starts with building the model in Revit from the documents the client supplies, and runs through to the floor plans, sections, elevations, details and general arrangement drawings that come out of it. Where a project calls for it, we also do 3D modelling in Rhino or Inventor and convert the result into the format used further down the chain. As-built drawings are part of the standard package, as are revision rounds on existing sets. After all, much of the work we receive is not a blank sheet.
There is an existing DWG set that has grown out of control, or a model that has passed through several hands and is no longer built consistently. We deliver in DXF, DWG, the Revit formats and STEP, and in practice in any common CAD format. We always work with the latest versions of the software. Alongside the modelling itself, we build parametric Revit families: smart components that adapt to a different size or a different situation. The material schedule is linked to them, so a change to a component is immediately reflected in the schedule.
That saves the most time in sets where the same component appears in dozens of variants. We draw to the client's standard and drawing conventions, which they give us at the start. That way the delivered work fits in with what is already there, and nobody has to straighten out layers, hatching or naming afterwards. We can clean up existing families and templates or rebuild them from scratch, depending on the state they are in.
Who BIM modelling is a capacity question for
The companies that hand BIM modelling over to us are engineering firms, architectural practices, contractors and manufacturers. The person across the table is usually a manager, a team leader or the owner, and the subject is hardly ever the technology. The subject is capacity. There is too little time, there are too few drafters, or there is a peak the in-house team cannot absorb. An architectural practice with three projects in progress at once never gets round to the modelling for the fourth. A manufacturer that wants its product line turned into smart components cannot free anyone up internally to do it.
For a contractor it often comes up at the end of a project, when the as-built file has to be updated while the drawing office has already moved on to the next job. In all of these cases the problem is the same. The work has to be done, it is predictable and repetitive, and it ties up people who should really be working on something else. We take that part off your hands. You pay no ongoing salary costs and you are not stuck with staff sitting idle once the peak has passed. If someone on our side is off sick or on holiday, we replace that person and the work simply carries on.
With our large, flexible team of drafters, we scale up or down per project, depending on what is needed. The team is already in place, so when something is urgent we add people straight away instead of having to recruit first. Our clients are based in the Netherlands, and that is where our focus lies. The trigger varies, but the question always comes down to the same thing.
No ongoing payroll costs and no idle staff once the peak is over. If one of our people is off sick or on holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
How a BIM modelling project runs
A BIM modelling project with us starts with a conversation. In it we go through what is already there, what needs to be finished and which drawing conventions apply. The client supplies the details and usually also existing drawings that need revising. Barry, our project manager, is the first point of contact for a new enquiry, after which Sam takes over the technical side, so there is one consistent line of communication throughout the project. We respond to every enquiry within 1 to 2 working days. With enough information, we can start straight away. We do not deliver everything in one go at the end, but in stages. A first batch goes back, the client reviews it, we collect the feedback, make the changes and move on to the next batch. That prevents weeks of work going in a direction that later turns out to be wrong.
The rhythm of meetings differs per client. On a project that has to move fast, we speak every two days; for calmer work, once a week is enough. Files go back and forth by email, and on larger projects we use software the client can log into to follow progress themselves. For standalone AutoCAD drafting, email remains the quickest route. Day-to-day contact runs through email, phone calls and meetings, and we are happy to visit you or welcome you at our office. We work in our own environment with our own licences, so nothing needs to be set up or opened up on the client's side. A short first assignment is possible if you would like to see how we work first.
Three review layers before anything goes out
Every model and every drawing passes through at least three review layers before anything leaves our office. A drafter produces the work, a second team member checks it, Sam then reviews the technical side as team leader, and Barry, as project manager, goes over it one final time. That may sound like a lot, but it is the reason the number of errors stays minimal in practice.
With modelling work, the gain lies mainly in what does not happen. A wrongly chosen layer, a family built slightly differently from the rest of the set, a dimension taken from an outdated revision: things like that cost far more time further down the line than the checking itself.
For Firefly we worked on an as-built file in which the existing drawings had been printed incorrectly and were partly hand-drawn. The whole thing was hard to read and messy. Rather than constantly phoning the client about it, we sorted it out ourselves and still delivered a clean result. That attitude is built into our checks as well. We solve what we can solve, and we flag anything that needs a decision from the client.
The review goes beyond the drawing itself. We check whether the agreed standard has been applied consistently, whether the naming is correct and whether the output is in the right format. For Firefly we have now completed more than twenty projects and hundreds of drawings, and this way of working has held up throughout. Even with a deadline that could not move, the team kept going through evenings and weekends to deliver on time.
Frequently asked questions about BIM modelling
Hand your BIM modelling over to us
Send us your documents and drawing conventions and we will let you know within one to two working days what we can take on and when.