Construction phase oriented dynamic simulation: Taking RCC dam placement process as an example

Abstract

Construction simulation has been widely applied in schedule analysis. However, traditional simulation is based on static models built in the planning or design phase, which focuses on overall project-level schedule analysis. To provide activity-level simulation for on-site schedule management, a construction phase oriented dynamic simulation method is proposed, which takes roller compacted concrete (RCC) dam placement process as an example. Considering various inner-layer and inter-layer activities and different construction organization modes, a detailed placement process simulation model is built. Based on construction data collected by real-time monitoring, a construction activity modeling method is given. Additionally, Dirichlet process mixture (DPM) models are applied for simulation parameter updates, which endows density estimation with considerable flexibility and robustness. A fast inference algorithm is also proposed to realize the fast posterior computation of DPM models. The proposed method is tested by an RCC dam project in southwest China. The results show that the proposed method can reflect the dynamic features of the actual placement process in the construction phase and provide accurate schedule predictions for on-site construction management.