Construction Simulation

Construction Simulation

Plays your Revit model being built over time, with the construction programme and the cost curve attached. Generate the sequence from the model, price it, watch it in 3D, and put the film, the dated sheets and the data back into Revit — or on to Navisworks, Twinmotion and Unreal.

"4D" means the model plus time: every element knows when it is built, so the building can be played like a film. "5D" adds money: each task carries a quantity and a rate, so the same clock draws a cash-flow curve.

What it does

• Opens into Project studio, with a compact assistant beside a large 3D canvas. Navigation and viewer settings start closed. Every panel can close; Ctrl+B restores navigation and Ctrl+K opens any workspace. Essential screens stay at the top of navigation; All tools holds the detailed controls.
• Creates and updates the programme through BimCode AI. Describe the project and press Build my plan, or leave the brief empty to use sensible defaults. The assistant reads the model, chooses a supported methodology, links actual model elements, and adds preparation and handover activities. Without model geometry it creates a brief-based programme. Dates, costs and dependency cycles are checked before the plan is applied as one Undo operation. Update my plan applies validated edits to an existing programme. Missing rates are explicitly flagged; estimated costs are not actual expenditure. The action rechecks the AI connection and explains unavailable accounts instead of being silently disabled. A programme changed during generation is never overwritten.
• Generates images and videos using BimCode AI. Describe the result and press Generate. AI chooses either the current camera/construction stage or four surrounding views of the completed model. References are captured automatically and remain visible with each session result. Upload up to four images if preferred; their combined limit is 8 MB. Video uses one first-frame image and requires the connected BimCode video service. Format and reference overrides are under More options. The prompt panel closes to expand the preview. Existing jobs can be followed without submitting another generation. Generation uses the signed-in account and configured media models.
• Reads the model and works out what each element is to the programme — slab, column, blockwork, cladding — from its category and type name, with rules you can change.
• Generates a programme from a construction methodology you choose: market-standard high-rise, refurbishment, precast and more, level by level, with the envelope chasing the frame. Or import one from Primavera or Microsoft Project and attach elements to its tasks by rule.
• Prices it from a rate book or your own rates, in dirhams or in dollars, and draws the budget, earned value and spend as an S-curve. Type what a task really cost and that figure takes the place of the estimate. Every element's own share of the money is listed, and can be searched and exported.
• Plays it in 3D in its own viewer: realistic materials, sun and sky, shadows, section cuts, labels that follow the work, cranes and hoarding that come and go, and planned-against-actual side by side. Elements can arrive with their own movement, simply switch on in a work-in-progress colour, or be uncovered by a cut, and work still to come can show as a see-through ghost.
• Keeps Revit in step. Every element can carry its task ("4D Task"), its kind of work ("4D Type") and its share of the cost ("5D Cost") as Revit parameters you can schedule, tag and filter on. Change an element's task or kind of work in Revit's Properties palette and it moves in the programme too. A Revit selection set can be saved for each task.
• Reports on progress: what is late, what is critical, what is coming up in the next few weeks, and where the money is going.
• Gets it out: an MP4, a storyboard, a sheet of real dated 3D views in Revit, the dates and costs written onto the elements as Revit parameters, and animated files for Twinmotion, Unreal, Navisworks and Unity.

When to use it

• A tender or a client presentation that needs the building to be seen going up, not described.
• Checking a methodology: whether the crane reaches, whether the envelope really can follow the frame at that pace, how long the job should take.
• A monthly progress report — planned against actual, by value, from the same model the programme was built on.
• A site team that works in Revit: the task and the cost of every element are in the Properties palette and in schedules, and a task can be changed there without opening this window.
• Handing a planner or a visualiser something they can open in their own tools.

How to run it

Open a project in Revit, then launch Construction Simulation from BimCode's plugin list inside Revit. The window is modeless, so Revit stays usable while it is open. Everything is saved beside the model and inside the project when you press Save. The Help tab carries the full manual.

A walk through the screens

This updates the existing V4D5DProMaxV7 plugin and retains its Revit entry point, saved programmes and plugin identity. Project studio opens first with the assistant embedded beside the model. AI image & video creates media through BimCode. Detailed workspaces are under All tools, including Project summary and manual planning tools. Press Ctrl+K to find any workspace. The detailed tools are:

1. Model — press Read the model. It lists what the model is made of by trade and by category, splits long elements (stairs, cores, risers) into one piece per level for the programme, and shows which elements have not found a trade yet.
2. Sequence — pick a methodology, read the sentences describing what will happen, set the start date and the crews, and press Generate the programme. A benchmark from the size of the building tells you whether the result is in the right range. The types of task — site, existing, new construction, temporary works, demolition — are listed here too, can be renamed and added to, and can be put on every element in Revit as "4D Type".
3. Programme — the Gantt and the task table. Edit tasks, links and calendars, save a baseline, import or export a programme, and save a Revit selection set for one task or for every task at once.
4. Assign — attach elements to tasks that did not come from the generator: by hand from the Revit selection, or by rule for a whole building of "Blockwork L07"-style tasks. Each row can take in or give up the current Revit selection, and a task can be made straight from it. This is also where "4D Task" is put into Revit, read back from it, and where you choose whether edits made in Revit are followed as they happen.
5. 4D — how the simulation behaves: playback speed, how elements arrive inside a task, the caption, the colours, and the simulation style.
6. 5D Cost — rates, resources, the budget, the S-curve and the cost report. Switch between dirhams and dollars, type what the work actually cost, look up the cost of any single element, and put "5D Cost" into Revit.
7. Reports — the dashboard: planned against actual, look-ahead, at-risk lists, cost by trade. Every table exports to CSV.
8. Scene — cranes, hoarding, huts, plant and deliveries, placed on a plan of the site with their reach drawn. Nothing here ever becomes a Revit element.
9. Simulate — load the model into the viewer and play it. Choose the simulation style, record a video, put a picture or a sheet of dated views into Revit, show a date in Revit's own view, cut a section, add labels, hide or paint anything you click.
10. Export — one destination at a time: FBX, Twinmotion and Unreal, Navisworks and Unity, Revit parameters, or a setup file that carries your rates, rules and methodologies to another machine.
11. Help — the manual, searchable.

Production availability in 1.2.0

AI planning and image generation use the signed-in BimCode services inside Revit. The localhost browser preview has no BimCode account connection. AI video generation and media-job recovery require the newer BimCode media service, which is not yet deployed to production. The plugin reports that service limitation.

Good to know

• Actual expenditure is separate from estimates. Quantity × rate × progress is an estimate, not a recorded payment. Reports and cost indices use recorded actuals; missing inputs show as unavailable. Progress and actual cost are snapshots at the data date, so the app does not invent an actual-spend history.
• Planning changes are validated and undoable. Build and Update apply only the documented activity fields after local scheduling checks. AI cannot run code or invoke Revit editing tools. Invalid, cyclic, oversized or stale results are refused. Durations and estimated rates need review against project resources and site conditions. Creation assumptions are retained with the saved programme.
• Rendering quality has a pixel budget. Balanced, High and Ultra control resolution and effects; switching quality does not change the construction programme. Model reloads dispose GPU resources, and lost graphics contexts offer a recovery path. Very large real models still need hardware testing.
• Reading the model is the slow part on a large project; Revit is busy while it runs, and it happens once per session.
• Splitting elements by level happens only in the simulation. Nothing is written to Revit unless you press a button that says so — Into Revit on the Export tab, a Put button for the three parameters, a selection set, or a picture or a sheet from the Simulate tab — and each of those is one undo step.
• "4D Task", "4D Type" and "5D Cost" are written when you press Put, and not again by themselves: after changing the programme, press Put again. The other way round is automatic while the window is open — a task or a kind of work changed in Revit is taken up here straight away, and a notice says what changed. Changes made while the window was closed come in with Read it back. The plugin's own writes are never mistaken for your edits.
• The rate books are in dirhams, and the dirham is pegged to the dollar at 3.6725, so switching between the two converts every rate and cost in the project — and back again. Any other currency changes only the symbol.
• Videos need a video encoder on the machine; where MP4 is not available the recording falls back to WebM and says so. A PNG frame sequence is always available.
• Twinmotion and Unreal take the sequence from a .glb; a Datasmith file cannot carry the animation, so it is not offered. Navisworks receives a .nwc from Revit's own exporter (which must be installed) plus a TimeLiner CSV you attach in one dialog.
• A satellite or survey image under the model has to be brought in by you — the plugin tells you the site's coordinates but downloads nothing.
• Rate books and programme benchmarks are Gulf high-rise figures and a starting point, not a quotation. Every number is editable.