MIIDEL was used in a project that involved thousands of drawings. We expect further automation in the future!

Chiyoda Corporation is a comprehensive engineering firm that manages a wide range of projects around the world. They focus on engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) across various sectors, including energy (oil and gas), chemical, environmental solutions, energy conservation, industrial equipment, batteries, and life sciences.

They have been using MIIDEL since MIIDEL3 and today we will be asking about how it has been used as well as requests for the future.

MIIDEL (M): Chiyoda Corporation is involved in the planning and construction of large plants both domestically and internationally. Do you deal with large volumes of technical drawings daily?

Mr Tanaka: It depends on the scale of the project. It typically involves 20 to 40 binders which amounts to several thousand pages.

Mr Sato: In a domestic project I have managed, we delivered over 150 binder files to the client.

Mr Tanaka was the first to implement and utilize MIIDEL in his project.

M: That is a huge amount! It's almost like moving house.

Tanaka: Comparing drawings is a very routine task for the person in charge, whether it comes from external or internal sources, or reviewing them with each new revision. However, it is incredibly difficult to do perfectly. If an issue was identified after it had been completed, it's already too late.

Sato: Even if changes are marked with revision clouds, other parts of the drawings could have also been unintentionally changed or reverted to earlier versions. Ideally, we would only need to check areas marked with revision clouds, but if we are unsure, we end up reviewing everything all over again which takes a lot of time.

M: Not to mention the sheer number of drawings... I can see how difficult that would be. Was 'better and faster drawing comparisons' identified as an issue within your company?

Tanaka: I first decided to try MIIDEL because I wanted to implement something new in my project after learning about it from an article in 'Nikkei Construction'. Unlike large overseas projects worth hundreds of billions of yen, the domestic projects I manage are more flexible, making it easier to introduce new tools. If it made our work easier, it would be a great addition to our company's digital productivity improvement initiatives. At first, I only introduced it to my project in 2018 but soon after expanded its use to the headquarters and introduced it to our group companies.

M: How often is MIIDEL used daily?

Sato: Rather than being used daily, we typically use it in certain stages of a project when the task of reviewing drawings peaks. Specifically, in the first half of the project when a ton of revisions are done because a lot of drastic changes are still happening. Later on in the project, changes became smaller and less frequent, so we would use MIIDEL less and less.

Tanaka: That's why I wanted to integrate MIIDEL into our business processes. Ideally, it would be incorporated into our document management system that is used to share documents with internal and external staff. It would be perfect if MIIDEL could identify when a file's revision number is updated and automatically compare and generate reports.

It would take a lot of development on your side though so it's going to be a bit tough (laughs).

M: I see, enhancing automation could be a way to improve the thoroughness of checks. Other than that, has there been any moment when using MIIDEL that stood out for you?

Sato: Just recently, I assisted with submitting a government application for a project, and they requested that we mark all the changes from the initial application. This included everything-- construction drawings, equipment diagrams, and documents.

However, all the revision clouds in the completed books have been removed. Not to mention, unlike comparing between versions, it was completely unclear what changed when comparing it to our initial application. The submission deadline was coming soon and if we missed it, our contract deadline with the client would also be delayed

It was an incredibly tense and difficult position to be in. Fortunately, MIIDEL was a lifesaver in this situation. Despite coming in to help as an outsider with no prior knowledge of the project, we were still able to divide the tasks and review them within a short amount of time.

Sato shared a story where he used MIIDEL to submit completed documents.

M: That sounds like the ideal MIIDEL story! We are glad to hear it was useful in such a difficult situation and as our final question, what do you expect from MIIDEL in the future?

Sato: Having MIIDEL identify files in certain folders and automatically match them with previous versions to be compared with would be incredibly helpful. Since the file naming conventions are mostly consistent, it would be great if MIIDEL could read and identify the different versions.

Tanaka: It is related to what I said earlier about automation. Reducing the amount of steps needed to get results from MIIDEL.

New features are being added one after another that weren't there when we first started using them. I believe these would make MIIDEL get used even more within the company.

*Revision clouds: A cloud-like mark on technical drawings or diagrams intended to show areas of change. It is named after its curly shape which resembles cartoon clouds

＊Completed documents submitted upon completion of construction. It includes implementation specifications, calculation sheets, construction drawings, equipment drawings, construction management records, and instruction manuals, etc.