We often receive (only) Navisworks files, mainly in the tender stage. When trying to work with those files, it is very difficult to extract quantities. Certainly if we’d move to a Qonic-based workflow in general it is not interesting to have to rely on another tool for half of our projects …
For that reason it would be very interesting to be able import the NWD directly into Qonic. I realize there are big difficulties related to the structure of the model and the properties. Much like with IFC’s generated by Tekla for example, the NWD project structure is not really according to the IFC structure on which Qonic is based. But if we’d be able to import the geometry and properties then we can start restructuring the data.
Currently there are no real-life solutions to convert NWD to IFC. So that is not really an option. Only workaround that I have used so far is to export as FBX and then into Blender (+Bonsai add-on) to convert that FBX back to IFC. But in that process all properties are lost.
Open Design Alliance have BimNV SDK that’d provide ability to import/export NWD.
Additional benefit would be, after importing the NWD federated model, use a section box to destructively ‘cull’ everything outside the section box so we have only geometry needed from the source As Built model.
Benefit is that the user wouldn’t need Navisworks (no macOS Navisworks app) which we typically need to hide what’s not needed, then export to FBX, open the FBX back into Navisworks, to save as NWD which then is used to as the import source of the As Built reference model. Actually, Navisworks 2027 has a new feature to export an NWD of only visible, so saves the FBX exporting trip. Navisworks can’t export only geometry inside the Section Box either so another Navis limitation.
Ideally, the first workflow is preferred, import NWD, cull, the win, no need for Navis at all. Web only baby!
…use a section box to destructively ‘cull’ everything outside the section box so we have only geometry needed from the source As Built model.
This would be a good method when using an NWD file as “real world context”. Comparable to the 3D tiles that just have been introduced, but then with higher accuracy.
I’m not sure if sections are always needed/the best way. In Navisworks, at least in my experience, the project tree is usually a good starting place to enable/disable certain parts of the model.
…(no macOS Navisworks app)…
This would be a good thing indeed! Though I’m sure Autodesk would say we don’t need a desktop app to view NWD files, we should just be using the Forma cloud platform in one way or another
It is interesting to read your view on the NWD angle, which seems more like a context-visualisation use case. That part should present less technical problems than my use case where we would want to do actual measurements/quantities on this geometry. And since NWD is all mesh-based compared to Qonic’s solid-modelling that is a difficult situation …
My approach is similar, im most cases, I use selection windows to select objects, right click Hide Unselected. But in some scenarios in a piperack pipe maybe in 200m lengths, where I need 10m, in this case, and if after the above mentioned process, I select what’s in the viewport create a section box around selected, then I want to resize the section box to slice off all the unwanted pipe lengths. Then Export only what’s in the section box because later in say in BricsCAD we cannot directly slice meshes.
As you may need Navis in the construction phase to measure and confirm, i’m just using the geometry as an in place reference to design around, not to modify it. Having the geometry in my design app its the source of truth my design references.
Well that’s them, typical, as mentioned though we don’t need them, we don’t want them and Open Design Alliance has a Navis SDK, any developer can implement import and export Navis files into their app like Qonic
like Qonic