Detailed biography
In 2012 I was studying Building Engineering when I started using Revit on my own. This tool made me realize that things could be done better and more organized. At that time, people in Spain were already beginning to hear what BIM was and what it entailed. For this reason, I devoured all the information that came to me about BIM and the new tools it could bring.
University stage
While I was at university, I tried to apply these tools to each of the subjects wherever possible. This allowed me to extract its potential and identify where one tool or another had a place . I was also lucky enough to get together with a group of students and professors to form a research group: CuBIM . In this group, I had the opportunity to continue experimenting and apply the BIM methodology to more real environments by participating in competitions. I have great memories of this stage because, apart from the good atmosphere we had, we obtained several awards and recognitions .
In parallel with university, every summer I used to help my father , Pedro Enrique Pérez del Moral. He was an Agronomist and worked making expert reports to assess accidents that normally occurred in the agricultural field. In these jobs, from time to time there would be a case where a building had to be evaluated and it was in that case where my father would save these reports for me to do in the summer. In these reports, he always made some model with Revit. He was trying to better illustrate where the damage had occurred and how it should be remedied. I also realized the facilities that BIM provided when, for example, in a warehouse that had suffered a fire, the bales of straw that fit could be located, knowing the maximum amount that had burned in order to be able to assess it.
In one of these summers, I had just taken the Pathology course and, together with everything I was learning about expertise, it made me realize everything I was about to do in these fields in terms of the use of new tools. It was then that it occurred to me, in 2017, to develop a new tool to help manage damage in pathologies.
Last year at university developing CoDa as a TFG
For its development, a friend, Rafael Otal , a computer developer specializing in Cybersecurity, helped me enormously . He was the first person who gave me ideas and told me what technologies he should learn to bring everything he had in mind to fruition. I wanted to develop this tool as a Final Degree Project . Developing a computer tool like TFG for Building Engineering was extremely unusual. However, David Valverde had no problem tutoring me on the project.
In this way, with Rafael and David as tutors, we began to compose the tool that would end up being called CoDa (Construction Damages): A web tool for managing damage to buildings. The development lasted a year of intense work. It took 4 months to learn the necessary computer languages and another 8 to create the website and documentation. Finally, in 2018, I presented this tool as a TFG, which combined the ability to see classified damage in a web environment with the ability to quantify, through a mathematical model, the degree of danger of a property. You can see an example of how this mathematical model works through this calculator that Rafael and I made before taking out the tool.
Stage in Valladares Engineering
After finishing the Degree in Building Engineering, I found a job at Valladares Engineering . This company allowed me to learn how BIM was applied in the most pragmatic and functional way possible. I joined as an MEP modeler under the orders of Adolfo Martínez, who at that time was Project Manager in this company. I was surprised by all the knowledge he had about Revit MEP and, in addition, the regulations, the calculation of installations and the ability to motivate teams. At this time, I participated mainly in residential typology projects, touching all possible disciplines within this field (plumbing, sanitation, electricity, air conditioning…). Based on the methodology that already existed in Valladares Engineering and the workflow that Adolfo and I were able to improve in collaboration with the engineers, we were able to carry out installation projects for residential buildings in two weeks .
Stage in BIM6D Consulting & Performance
In 2020 (yes, in the middle of the pandemic), Fernando Morales Tosar trusted me to work at BIM6D Consulting & Performance, a specific BIM consulting company. In this company, I had the opportunity to participate in very different projects. We made models of any type of building and discipline, in addition to carrying out other work typical of a BIM consultancy such as training, implementation and R&D development of new tools.
At this stage, I am especially proud to collaborate in the creation of new lines of business, such as the simulation of occupant flows. To establish this line of business, we first did a market study to find out which tool was the most suitable for performing this function, choosing Pathfinder for this purpose. Once the instrument was chosen to tackle this task, I learned how it worked and we began to apply it to real cases. We found international clients who had logistics warehouses and wanted to optimize the flow of the operators who worked in these centers. We established a workflow where the client defined a series of data on their workers (number, ages, distribution of workers by sex…) and we prepared a complete report with visual samples giving the results and providing improvements to the design.
After this, I was able to participate in jobs such as creating environments for virtual reality or developing plugins with C#. After this, I represented BIM6D working as an outsourcing modeler at IDOM.
After this, I was able to participate in jobs such as creating environments for virtual reality or developing plugins with C#. After this, I represented BIM6D working as an outsourcing modeler at IDOM.
Stage as an outsourcing BIM6D modeler at IDOM
IDOM is a large engineering company that works internationally. Pablo Villagrasa , BIM Manager, contacted BIM6D requesting collaborators for the development of the HVAC model of a mega factory in the pharmaceutical sector. Thanks to this, Pablo gave me the opportunity to participate in the project where I have felt most satisfied with the final result.
The client was the pharmaceutical company FAES FARMA , who needed to build a plant in Bilbao. In this plant and as in other projects in the pharmaceutical field, HVAC takes on great importance due to the demand for hygrothermal and hygienic conditions. Due to these demands and the entity of the building, my stay at IDOM modeling this discipline was extended by a year . During this time, I had the opportunity to work with incredibly valuable colleagues and from whom I could learn a lot. As the project progressed, more collaborators were needed, including in the HVAC discipline. Due to this and being the first person to arrive, I was presenting the project to each of my new colleagues and doing coordination tasks between them and the engineers, reaching up to 6 people modeling HVAC to meet the expected deadlines. It involved modeling almost 140 circuits for air conditioning and ventilation , which began to be installed on site before the entire installation model was finished. To coordinate all this, I developed a spreadsheet through which the engineers communicated the status of our model to us, combining it with incidents from BIM Collab . These incidents could be uploaded to this sheet to be able to filter them, which allowed us to prioritize those layouts that were going to be delivered and resolve only those that were associated with them.
Step by Step, we were solving the model while coordinating with the other disciplines of the project and, in this way, in June 2022 this stage ended in IDOM at the same time as in BIM6D.
Stage at Bassal Engineering
In June 2022, I started my current position as BIM Manager at Bassal Engineering . In this company, we are mainly dedicated to the construction management of logistics warehouses, but we also carry out projects of any other type from scratch, in addition to specific BIM services or processing of permits and tenders.
When I arrived at this company, although models were already used and there was an attempt at uniformity in terms of workflows from one project to another, the maximum potential that a BIM process can have was not widely used.
Therefore, in a first stage that lasted two months, I analyzed the work previously developed and then incorporated the appropriate measures in the subsequent months. The changes occurred in three areas:
- Nomenclatures
- Protocols
- Organization
What was sought when making changes in these areas was the creation of uniformity in the development of work, which would translate into an increase in workers’ performance by reducing adaptation times if they changed from one project to another. Furthermore, all this was collected in a single document to centralize all the information, where the worker could find all the answers he needed. In this first stage of change, I greatly appreciate the involvement of the rest of the team, who complied with nomenclatures and protocols and even contributed new ideas or content to contribute to the BEP or the company’s good practices.
Parallel to the implementation of these changes, work had to continue to be produced. Therefore, I am also carrying out all the work necessary for the production of documentation. In addition, I usually visit construction sites to attend meetings and check the execution of the work, which makes it easier, among other things, to achieve the accuracy of the As-Built models that we produce.
In addition to my duties, I have been developing the company’s website and LinkedIn page, to improve the brand image and obtain potential clients.
Currently and personally, in my spare time I am working on a side project.
damagespotter.com, consists of the development of a tool that, through a photo and the use of Artificial Intelligence, analyzes and proposes solutions to construction pathologies.
It is a project that makes me especially excited because, thanks to it, I am applying and acquiring new programming skills.
