Edgewise vs Faro As-Built

[jtzambrano22]

I have recently been looking for Scan to BIM software to save some time on modeling large industrial factories post scan and was pointed in the direction of Edgewise. The real deliverable I am looking for is getting piping, duct work and structural members modeled without having to measure every single little detail in Recap. I have done the trial and was pretty impressed aside from a whole lot of false positive pipes (more than likely beginners error on my part) but I haven't been able to find a whole lot when it comes to comparing it against the Faro As-Built software. I spoke with both an Edgewise rep and our current Faro rep and neither were able to really give me a good answer on how one stacks up against the other so I was hoping to get some feed back from the forum by people who have actually used either of these.

[pipingdesigner]

It's unfortunate but not surprising that there's no independant third party that tests software like this and posts unbiased reviews.

I'm also guessing that successful workflows might be considered proprietary knowledge by some companies.

[gordonired]

I can't really comment on Edgewise, I last trialed their software in 2018/2019 I believe. We use as-built here, and it is only really useful for a few things. The pipe extraction is pretty good, and I'd say it gives satisfactory results down to 1" pipe. It also can fit planes pretty well. That is the extent to which I use it.

We model our piping in different software, and only use those extracted pipes as rough "guides" to get our model near to where it needs to be. It exports as a .dxf and lines up with our point clouds, scales nicely etc. I use the stand alone version, called as-built modeler. The autocad plugin was good, but it had lots of features we didn't use, and it wasn't worth paying for autocad, when the standalone did what we needed just fine.

All in all, I would maybe use either of these as a place to get started on your model, and the rest is very manual and tedious. Pipes are easy, it's flanges and fittings and as-built horrors that make modelling difficult, and that require that human touch still.

[surveypm]

I haven't used Edgewise but have used As-built and As-built Modeler. I mostly agree with Gordon's use (cylinders and planes) and findings. However, I have extracted some structural commercial shapes using As-built. I've used it on manufacturing facilities rather than office buildings. I think for office buildings it could work well. In factories, getting really good scans is imperative, otherwise the matching can go awry. Often columns in factories have conduit and/or pipes on them which limits where you can get a clean area to match. Slicing method in As-built is okay but you have to be rally close on column with objects attached.
I'm not fond of having to use Recap files in AutoCAD. I liked the VirtuSurv Faro had which used the fls files directly imported although it had no real automation. I only use it for certain functions like Gordon and not a whole factory. I don't know anyone who does. On projects where a third party modeled a whole factory building they used Rhino but I don't know their methodology.
Good luck, maybe others have some thoughts.

[Dave Andrews]

I have both. Edgewise I feel is faster overall to use, its not AutoCAD. When I am using edgewise it is typically for an area of a plant or a column line of a plant. So I model the piping myself which is much faster and less stuff you do not need throughout the project. The duct work is so-so, the insulated stuff is very difficult to deal with which is understandable. Structural is great, especially if you have an idea of the sizes, then it is much faster.

[melshy]

I tried both and recomment Faro if you use Revit, Autocad. If plantID Edgewise

[Sullivan132]

Hello to all,

I also recommend Faro. I find it more convenient to use.