Integrated project management framework for a pipe spool fabrication shop

Abstract: Modularization of heavy industrial construction is generally employed in Canada’s oil and gas projects. The concept of modularization is becoming increasingly popular, but this type of work demands accuracy and quality to ensure overall productivity improvement and avoid re-work on site. Construction of industrial modules involves a considerable amount of pre-fabrication of piping spools. The availability of actual labour cost and productivity data is important to accurate pricing and profitable billing but also provides a valid basis for cost estimating on similar projects and for shop production scheduling. Yet of date, the current practice is still largely to utilize industry benchmark data and personal experiences to estimate new jobs, price products and prepare invoices. Visibility into actual labour costs in a timely fashion lends a competitive edge to project planning and control throughout engineering, pricing, estimating and billing activities. The objective of this research study is to automate the collection of actual labour costs which ensures the accuracy of the cost data and improves productivity by eliminating manual paper-and-pen based procedures. A radio frequency-based indoor positioning system was developed and employed for real-time localizing and tracking pipe spool fabrication processes inside a pipe spool fabrication shop. With the enabling technology available, we propose a research framework intended to integrate fabrication process planning and tracking with the drawing and document control system, the materials management system, the labour costing system and the production progress control system. Experiments were conducted inside the fabrication shop of a partner company in order to evaluate the potential and limitations of the proposed research framework. The proposed system is not only able to automatically track actual labour-hours and thus actual labour cost in real-time, it can also provide estimators with precise and accountable labour productivity norms for project cost estimation , if used over a long enough period of time. Moreover, the availability of real-time actual labour-hour information enables us to assess and improve the construction company’s competitiveness through labour productivity benchmarking and production progress measurement. The results from this study will help owners and contractors to understand the variability in process piping estimates and the importance of calibrating existing methods before applying them on real-world projects. This information can also be useful in analyzing the risk associated with the project’s capital costs and resolving estimating issues.