Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354 – 367

www.elsevier.com/locate/autcon

Tracking and locating components in a precast storage yard utilizing

radio frequency identification technology and GPS
Esin Ergen a , Burcu Akinci b,⁎, Rafael Sacks c
a
Department of Civil Engineering, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, 34469, Turkey
b
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, 15213, USA
c
Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel
Accepted 25 July 2006

Abstract

Problems in existing manual methods of identifying, tracking and locating highly customized prefabricated components result in late deliveries,
double-handling and misplacement of components, and incorrect installations that lead to schedule delays and increased labor costs. To eliminate these
deficiencies, an automated system using radio frequency identification technology combined with GPS technology, requiring minimal worker input, is
proposed. The requirements and approaches needed to utilize the system for locating precast concrete components with minimal worker input in the
storage yard of a manufacturing plant were developed. Based on the requirements identified and approaches formalized, a prototype system was
developed, assembled and tested in the field at a precast storage yard. The prototype system succeeded in automatically identifying pieces that were
relocated, demonstrating feasibility of the approach.
© 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Automated tracking; Locating; Radio frequency identification; Precast; Component

1. Introduction sources to track and locate components using manual approaches

In construction supply chains, problems in poorly identifying,
tracking and locating highly customized prefabricated compo-
nents result in late deliveries, double-handling and misplacement
of components, and incorrect installations that lead to schedule
delays and increased labor costs [1]. Tracking and locating prefa-
bricated components individually at any point across a construc-
tion supply chain is a challenging task. Manufacturing plants of
prefabricated components have a dynamic nature where many
unique components are frequently relocated and shipped daily.
Similarly, prefabricated components are frequently received,
stored, relocated and installed at construction sites. The cus-
tomized nature of prefabricated components amplifies the chal-
lenge of identifying and locating them along their supply-chain
due to the fact that most of them are unique and therefore need to
be tracked individually. Under these challenging conditions, both
prefabrication companies and contractors invest significant re-
⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 412 268 2959; fax: +1 412 268 7813.
E-mail address: bakinci@cmu.edu (B. Akinci).
0926-5805/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.autcon.2006.07.004
[1,2].
The objective of the study described in this research was to
identify the requirements for and develop an appropriate auto-
mated approach to tracking and locating precast concrete (hence-
forth termed simply ‘precast’) components in a manufacturer's
storage yard using advanced tracking technologies. Since just-in-
time delivery is required for precast pieces at construction sites, it
is critical for a precast manufacturer to know exactly where any
individual piece is located in a storage yard, so that any com-
ponent that is requested from a construction site can be located
and supplied quickly [2–4]. Precast storage yards typically cover
several thousands of square yards; in the case of large-scale
precast companies, yards commonly contain up to 4500 pieces at
any given point in time. Accurately and reliably tracking such a
large number of components in a wide area is a challenging task.
Existing approaches for tracking components utilize manual
tracking by paper-based documents or barcodes. Information
collected using such labor-intensive methods is not reliable or
complete since these data collection methods rely on workers'
motivation. Unreliability in material tracking might result in
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
delays in shipping due to pieces that cannot be located on time or
misplaced pieces that have to be manufactured again [2]. Current
practice highlights the need for a tracking system that provides
up-to-date location information for precast pieces in the storage
yard with minimum human input.
Radio frequency identification (RFID) integrated with the
global positioning system (GPS) provides an opportunity to
uniquely identify precast components and to track and locate
them using minimal or no worker input. Although RFID tech-
nology is being used to track assets in other industries, very little
research has been conducted in the architecture, engineering and
construction (AEC) industry or in facility management (FM) on
the utilization of RFID technology for tracking components
[1,3,5–8]. Among these studies, only Song et al. [8] provided a
reasoning mechanism based on a proximity method for locating
materials in a construction site using RFID and GPS. In this
approach, construction site is scanned daily in detail to identify
the location of materials on a given site. Whereas, in the
research described in this paper, the goal has been to track
components as they are moved to different locations within a
storage yard.
To identify the requirements and to develop reasoning me-
chanisms, an initial field test was conducted to test the per-
formance of RFID on precast components and GPS in a precast
yard. Based on the results of such an initial test, a detailed list of
requirements and corresponding approaches was formalized. A
prototype system, which utilizes the approaches, was then
developed, assembled and tested in the same precast storage
yard.
2. Background
Baldwin et al. [2] identified the need for improvement in
locating precast components in a storage yard and conducted a
field test at a precast plant to determine the feasibility of using
barcodes at the storage yard and during shipping. In spite of the
labor-intensive data collection activities associated with the
utilization of barcodes, during which pieces are manually scan-
ned at each and every relocation in the storage yard, typical
savings were estimated to be very high: 70% time saving during
checking out precast beams while loading to a trailer, 30% time
saving in locating a beam in a storage yard, and 85% time
saving in clerical time for entering beam data to the company's
computer system. However, our observations at a precast
manufacturing plant that utilizes barcodes for tracking compo-
nents during storage showed that workers try to avoid labor-
intensive barcode scanning activities and as a result, the data is
not complete. If the data is not complete, then it is not con-
sidered reliable and therefore not considered worth maintaining.
This creates a detrimental spiral of decreasing trust on the part
of the workers to the data provided in such databases. In prac-
tice, it has been observed that the expected savings of using
barcodes have not been fully realized.
Besides barcodes, various other automated identification
technologies, such as two dimensional barcodes, RFID, optical
character recognition and touch probes exist [5,9–12]. Most of
these technologies require line-of-sight to capture identification
355
information, and thus have limited identification range requi-
ring that a labor-intensive scanning activity be performed on
each object. In addition, some of these technologies cannot
survive in harsh environmental conditions (e.g., rain, dust,
impact), typically encountered in precast storage yards. RFID
technology is durable, does not theoretically require line-of-
sight and some types of RFID technology have relatively long
reading/detection ranges up to 30–90 m.
RFID has two main components: a reader and a tag. The tag,
which consists of an electronic chip coupled with an antenna, is
attached to an object and stores data about the object. The
reader, combined with an external antenna, reads/writes data
from/to a tag via radio frequency and transfers data to a host
computer. Some tags have LED notifying the user with a blin-
king light during communication. Reading and writing ranges
depend on the operation frequency (low, high, ultra high and
microwave), whether the tag needs a battery to operate (active)
or not (passive) and whether some materials, which can interfere
with radio signals, exist in the environment (e.g., concrete,
steel). Finally, unlike barcodes, RFID tags can withstand harsh
conditions [1,5].
Tags operating at ultra high frequency (UHF) typically have
longer reading ranges than tags operating at other frequencies.
Similarly, active tags have typically longer reading ranges than
passive tags. However, a limitation of active RFID technology
is that it requires battery management since the lifetime of an
internal battery is approximately 5–10 years. In addition, the
cost of active tags and readers is relatively high compared to
barcode technology. However, since it is an evolving technol-
ogy, new RFID systems have consistently decreasing costs and
increasing data storage capacities.
In recent years, different industries started to use RFID
technology to track a variety of discrete components, such as
vehicles, containers, assets and people. Tracking containers in a
port is similar to tracking precast components in a storage yard:
Both containers and precast components are large in size, are
stacked on top of each other in large storage areas and similar
cranes are used to relocate the pieces. The current applications
for tracking containers at a port via RFID do not utilize RFID
for automated identification of containers, but only for
automated tracking of containers. In those applications, con-
tainer identification processes rely on optical character recog-
nition (OCR) [13] or manual identification [14]. RFID is only
used for automatically tracking the cranes that carry the iden-
tified containers' in the storage yard via real-time locating
systems. However, in this research explained in this paper, the
goal is to use RFID during the entire tracking and locating
processes including identification of components.
Previous research on RFID in the construction industry
mostly focused on three areas: (1) identification of conceptual
applications of RFID technology in construction [14,15], (2)
performance of RFID for automated identification during deli-
very and receipt of components [1,5,16], and (3) for tool
tracking [7] at construction sites. In all these studies, com-
ponents were either manually scanned with handheld readers
[5,7,16] or scanned at a fixed portal as a trailer with components
passed through a gate [1]. Only one research effort focused on
356 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
locating the materials that are scattered on a construction site,
and combined active UHF RFID and GPS technologies using
proximity techniques [8]. This approach provides approximate
locations of materials on construction site, and it can be used as
a front-end solution for the research described in this paper to
identify the components' initial locations in the storage yard.
GPS, a relatively mature technology, is also used for tracking
objects in outdoor environments. GPS was used to track the
real-time location of equipment on construction sites in several
research studies [17–19]. Although Navon and Shpatnitsky [20]
identified GPS technology as an accurate and robust technology
for automated data collection for road construction control, they
acknowledged the inaccuracy of GPS data observed which was
caused by objects that shielded the communication of the GPS
receiver with satellites.
In combination, RFID and GPS technologies present an
opportunity to track large precast components with minimum
labor input in a large storage yard. However, prior to the current
work, no research has been pursued to identify the requirements
and reasoning mechanisms needed to exploit these advanced
tracking technologies for this particular application.
3. Existing conditions and high-level requirements
The research described in this paper was conducted in
collaboration with a large-scale precast manufacturer. The com-
pany operates a state-of-the-art information system with bar-
code labeling. The storage yard at the facility where the field
tests were carried out has a total area of 190,000 m2, where
pieces are typically stored from 3 weeks to 6 months before
shipping. The tests were performed in the double-tee compo-
nent storage yard, where the majority of problems in existing
practice are observed: double tee pieces are comparatively very
Fig. 1. A portion of the double-tee storage yard.
large, they are almost indistinguishable externally (despite
being unique in internal design), and generally represent the
large majority of the pieces in buildings of which they are a part.
A double-tee is a type of precast concrete beam that is used
as a slab in precast structures. Typical dimensions of a double-
tee produced by this manufacturer are 0.6 m in height, 4 to 5 m
in width and 10 to 15 m in length. They are transported within a
storage yard by mobile gantry cranes. Double-tees are placed on
top of each other when stored; each vertical group of compo-
nents is called a “stack”. A stack can have up to five double-
tees. A storage yard is typically divided into zones, commonly
called as “aisles”. Each aisle is composed of rows and each row
has two stacks (Fig. 1).
3.1. Opportunities for improvement in the current storage
processes
Effective tracking and locating of pieces in a storage yard is
primarily needed to provide just-in-time (JIT) deliveries to
construction sites. Precast components are large in size and
delivered incrementally, almost everyday, to job sites; thus,
everyday many pieces need to be located at a precast storage
yard. Currently, anecdotal evidence shows that locating a piece
takes from 5 min to 5 h depending on the accuracy and com-
pleteness of the location information. Delays in locating pieces
require utilization of additional resources to find pieces, while a
failure to locate a piece has a more significant impact in terms of
time and cost since that piece has to be manufactured again.
Moreover, delays in shipping of pieces result in wasted re-
sources (cranes and crews) at the site and consequent delays in
construction schedules.
In addition to locating pieces for shipping, precast manu-
facturers also need to locate pieces periodically prior to shipping,
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367 357

Fig. 2. Schematic layout used to record locations of double-tees in a storage yard.

for inspection, surface treatment, patching, etc. For example,
owners' representatives visit manufacturing plants to check
pieces in terms of quality and quantity. During these visits, all
pieces in a building (usually hundreds and often thousands) are
inspected; delays or failures to locate pieces not only result in
waste of time for both manufacturers' and owners' staff, but also
foster mistrust between the two parties.
The current tracking process includes a data collection
activity that has to be repeated each time a piece is relocated in a
storage yard. The storage process for a double-tee starts with a
piece being taken to the storage yard once it is cast and cured.
The piece is placed on top of one of the stacks in the yard and its
ID and its location are recorded. During storage, a double-tee
might be moved several times if a piece underneath that double-
tee in the stack needs to be treated or shipped. Each time the
piece is moved, its new location must be collected and recorded.
Finally, when an erector confirms the delivery date for this type
of piece in the daily load list, material handling personnel
retrieve the location records for the storage yard and locate the
piece to load it onto a trailer for shipping.
To locate pieces effectively, the location data must be collected
and recorded accurately, and they should be easily retrieved by the
material handling personnel. In the cases observed at two plants,
both paper-based methods and barcodes were used. In the paper-
based approach, the ID of the piece is written on the piece and the
aisle and row IDs are written at each row. Once a piece is placed in
a stack, a worker identifies in which aisle and row the piece was
placed using the storage yard's schematic layout plan, and
recording the ID of the piece for that location on the layout plan
(Fig. 2). This process is repeated for each piece that is relocated in
the storage yard, and the storage layout plan is manually updated
accordingly. When a piece needs to be located, workers scan the

Fig. 3. Proposed approach for automating tracking and locating of precast pieces.
358 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
layout and manually search for the ID of the required piece. This
method is error-prone and time-consuming since data collection,
entry and retrieval are done manually.
In the barcode approach, a barcode label is attached to each
piece after it is cast. In addition, each stack location has a
barcode. As a piece is placed in a stack, a worker locates the
barcode on the piece and climbs up the stack to scan its barcode.
Then, the same worker walks up to one end of the stack, which
could be 12–15 m away, to scan the barcode of the stack. This
data is then sent to a database using wireless communication. In
this approach, data entry is performed automatically and data is
retrieved more effectively since IDs are stored in a database in a
searchable format. However, data collection is still manual.
Both paper-based and barcode methods are not very effective
because of their dependence on manual data collection. Manual
data collection is labor-intensive and thus expensive and
inefficient. Since workers have to spend extra time to collect
information and this is considered as a secondary task, data
collection is sometimes neglected or not fully performed. This
results in incomplete or inaccurate data that leads to misplaced
pieces in the storage yard.
3.2. High-level requirements for tracking precast pieces
Based on the description of the current practice described in
the previous section, data collection was identified as the
primary focus for improvement by utilizing advanced tracking
technologies. In light of the failures of the existing system, the
following high-level requirements were defined:
(1) The new location of a piece delivered to the storage yard
shall be identified with minimal or no worker input.
(2) Any piece that is relocated in the storage yard shall be
identified with minimal or no worker input.
(3) The accuracy with which a piece is identified and located
shall be higher than with the current system; ideally, it
should get close to zero error.
(4) Performance reduction of any selected technology under
harsh construction conditions (e.g., noise, dust, harsh
light) and under the presence of metal and concrete shall
be minimal: Pieces are stored in an open air environment,
therefore visibility may be obscured due to sunlight.
Metal cranes are used, and the pieces themselves have
large volumes of steel and concrete; metal and concrete
are commonly observed in the environment.
4. Automated tracking
To meet the requirements for minimum worker input and
minimum change to the current storage process, an automated data
collection approach was developed. In this approach, RFID tags
that contain unique ID numbers are placed on precast pieces, and an
RFID reader is mounted on the mobile gantry crane, as indicated in
Fig. 3. Each time a piece is picked up and moved, the ID informa-
tion of the piece is captured by the RFID reader. At the times of pick
up and release of the load–which are identified by a load cell on the
crane–the location of the crane (and thus the piece) is read from a
GPS receiver, which is also mounted on the crane. The ID and
location information of the piece is then sent to a database
for retrieval for shipping or for inspection by the owner or architect
later.
It is expected that automatic collection of location informa-
tion of the pieces can minimize inaccurate or incomplete data
due to minimum human involvement as long as the accuracy of
the automated approach exceeds the accuracy and completeness
of the manual and barcode-based approach. Accurate location
information will be used to locate pieces in a timely manner.
This will reduce the resources used for locating misplaced
pieces, delays in shipping, eliminate the need for replacing
missing pieces, and thus improve the reliability and stability of
just-in-time deliveries to construction sites.
Exploration of the feasibility of this conceptual approach to
automation of tracking of precast pieces using existing techno-
logies was pursued in the following steps:
(a) selection of appropriate technologies, statement of de-
tailed requirements and identification of appropriate hard-
ware, including preliminary field testing,
(b) development of a prototype and of the necessary data
processing algorithms,
(c) design and assembly of a physical prototype for proof of
concept and
(d) field tests.
The first three steps are described in this section; the results
of the field tests are reported in the following section.
4.1. Functional requirements and technology selection
The identified requirements emphasize the need for mini-
mizing or eliminating worker input when tracking and locating
components. Among available identification technologies,
barcode (one-dimensional and two-dimensional), optical char-
acter recognition and touch probes do not meet this requirement
because they require human action to effect a reading (they all
need line-of-sight or direct contact at short range). They also
require clean environments. RFID technologies that have longer
reading ranges (i.e., UHF and microwave frequencies) meet the
minimum worker input requirement since they enable identi-
fication of objects from relatively long distances without line of
sight. Thus, RFID technology operating at UHF or microwave
frequencies was selected for identification of pieces.
In addition to RFID, GPS technology was selected since it is
a mature technology used for tracking objects in open air. What
makes GPS technology applicable and feasible in this case is
that precast pieces can only be moved by cranes. It is therefore
ensured that the location of the crane can be used to establish the
location of the pieces, using only a single GPS receiver mounted
on the crane instead of a receiver placed on each piece.
4.1.1. RFID technology
The technology-specific requirements for the RFID system
in the proposed approach, based on the high-level requirements,
were the following:
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
Fig. 4. Distances between aisles and rows in a storage yard.
• To automatically identify each piece that is picked up by the
crane, the reading range must be at least 3 m. This requirement
derives from the geometry of the crane and the pieces (Fig. 4).
It is the distance between the optimal location of the reader
with respect to the location of the tag on a typical piece that is
being carried. The RFID tag on the piece should always be in
the range of the RFID reader during identification to enable
automatic identification on demand. In the case of the mobile
gantry cranes, the optimal location for the tag is the center of
gravity point on each piece, while the corresponding reader
Fig. 5. (a) Passive UHF RFID system, (b) active UHF RFID system.
359
antenna would be placed at the center of gravity of the picking
bar (a steel girder used to distribute the load of the piece).
• To prevent “multiple simultaneous tag readings”, the maximum
reading range should be limited to 5 m. This requirement
derives from the geometry of the pieces and the layout of the
storage yard (see Fig. 4). Given the typical width of pieces, the
shortest distance between the centers of gravity of adjacent
pieces is at least 5 m. When a piece is placed on a stack, it is
desirable that the tags on neighboring pieces should not be
readable, as this would create uncertainty as to which ID is the
correct one. This requirement can be relaxed by using an algo-
rithm to distinguish between multiple readings (as described
below) or if the signal strength can be measured, in which case
the strongest signal read would be assumed to be the correct ID.
• To minimize the performance reduction of selected technol-
ogy under harsh conditions (e.g., rain or possible impacts
from different pieces of equipment) and while in contact with
metal and concrete, RFID tags will be encapsulated or
insulated. At the chosen frequencies (i.e., UHF and micro-
wave), the reading range of the tags decreases if the tags are
attached to metal or concrete objects. The degree of degra-
dation depends on how much of the area of a tag is in contact
with the object. Thus, encapsulated or insulated tags are
needed to prevent direct contact with precast pieces. In
addition, RFID tags contain a chip and an antenna; if the tag
is not encapsulated with a durable material, both could be
damaged by moisture or impact (workers continuously climb
on double-tees to attach them to the crane).
• The RFID antenna should have wireless communication with
the host computer. The reason for this requirement is that the
360 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
picking bar is suspended by cables from the frame of the
gantry crane and moves in relation to the frame, making a
cable connection highly undesirable.Various products were
evaluated in terms of meeting these functionalities and two
specific candidate RFID systems were selected: a passive
UHF RFID system (Fig. 5a) and an active UHF RFID system
(Fig. 5b). Both systems had the longest reading ranges in
their respective categories. The active system was claimed to
have up to 30 m reading range in open air, and the passive
system was claimed to have a corresponding 4.5–7.5 m
reading range. Both active and passive tags were encapsu-
lated or insulated to perform effectively around metal and in
harsh environments. However, both technology suppliers
stated that the RFID systems need to be tested in real-life
conditions to determine the actual reading range when the
tags are in contact with concrete and metallic objects that
exist in the environment.
A preliminary field test was conducted to evaluate the per-
formance of the two selected RFID systems in real conditions at
a precast storage yard, to refine the technology-specific functio-
nalities and to identify the reasoning mechanisms needed for
Fig. 6. Hardware setup in the prototype system.
the prototype application. Since no RFID equipment with
wireless communication with the antenna is available, the RFID
tags were placed at the center points of the long sides of the
pieces and the antenna was placed on the operator's cabin. To
test the RFID systems, a piece was picked up by the crane and
carried to another stack; tags were read continuously during the
process to determine if the piece that was picked up could be
detected all the time. In addition, the reading success for tags
that were placed at different locations on a component was
investigated.
The results of the preliminary test demonstrated that the
active RFID system performed well in-real-life conditions;
however, the passive RFID system did not meet the require-
ments. For the passive system, the reading range was measured
to be between 1 and 5.5 m, i.e., it was not consistently and
reliably greater than the minimum requirement (3 m). In addi-
tion, detection of the tags was not reliable because tags were
observed to fall out of reading range if they were not in line with
the antenna both horizontally and in elevation. This demon-
strated that passive RFID systems are not reliable in a dynamic
environment, where the antenna and the tags are not closely in
line with each other all the time.
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
The observed reading range for the active UHF RFID system
was approximately 6–7.5 m, which is 20%–25% of the nominal
reading range. This result meets the minimum requirement. The
reading range of the active RFID technology was sufficient to
read the piece ID regardless of the location of the picking bar.
However, it was not possible to read through a component.
Another interesting result of the field test of active RFID tags
was that, during relocation, the reader not only detected the tag
that was attached to the piece being relocated, but also other tags
that were close by. The inability to restrict the reading range,
violating the maximum range requirement, demonstrated the
need for a reasoning mechanism that can filter all the tag IDs
that are collected during relocation in order to uniquely identify
the piece that is actually picked up.
4.1.2. GPS
The technology-specific requirements for the GPS were
identified as follows, based on the high-level requirements and
the proposed approach given in the previous section:
• To uniquely identify the locations of pieces that are placed in
different rows or aisles, the GPS unit will have an accuracy
of at least 2.5 m. The distance between the aisles is appro-
ximately 6 m and the distance between two adjacent rows is
approximately half a meter (Fig. 4). Given the typical width
Fig. 7. (a) Schematic top view and (b) schematic side view of a gantry crane carrying a double-tee at two extreme locations (positions 1 and 2).
361
of pieces, the shortest distance between the centers of gravity
of adjacent pieces is at least 5 m.
• The GPS receiver shall have a wireless communication with
the host computer. As explained above, the approach for
identifying the location requires that location data be collec-
ted at the center points of pieces. Thus, the GPS receiver
must be placed at the center point of the picking bar of the
crane. As in the case of the RFID antenna, since the picking
bar is a mobile component of the crane, wires connecting the
GPS to the host computer would limit the movement of the
picking bar.
• The GPS unit will be durable to function in open air conditions.
Since the GPS unit will be placed on the picking bar of the
crane, it should be durable to open air conditions such as rain.
Budget constraints dictated that a GPS receiver with less than
the required accuracy was used for the field tests and the
prototype. The GPS receiver used had a nominal accuracy of
5 m with WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System) data cor-
rection and 15 m without the WAAS capability. WAAS is based
on a series of satellites and ground antennas that correct data
transmitted between satellite and GPS devices. The GPS re-
ceiver used in the test used wireless communication with the
host computer using Bluetooth technology. It was also wea-
therproof. In the preliminary field test, the GPS unit was
362 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
Fig. 8. An example explaining the method for unique identification. The figure
shows a plan view of a storage yard and movement of the crane along with the
piece IDs detected.
mounted on the picking bar. No problems observed in com-
municating with the GPS receiver placed on a metallic picking
bar or receiving GPS signals, and the accuracy proved to be
close to the nominal accuracy.
The inaccuracy of the GPS unit was overcome by using an
approximation approach to identify the location and by assu-
ming that row-level accuracy for location is acceptable (since
currently the company tracks pieces by row numbers instead of
stack numbers). The approach, which is explained in the follo-
wing sections, acquires location data at center points of pieces
and compares them with the closest stack location. The closest
distance between center points of two stacks is approximately
11 m for the pieces that are placed at two stacks in adjacent
aisles. Thus, the accuracy required was half of this minimum
distance, which is 5.5 m.
Fig. 9. Identification of the location of a piece at point A using a geo-referenced site plan.
4.2. Prototype system design
The prototype system was developed by integrating the
active RFID system with a GPS unit using a laptop as a host
computer. The components of the system and their installation
locations are given in Fig. 6.
The RFID system was composed of a reader, an antenna and
active tags. The reader is in the form of a PCMCIA card plugged
into a laptop, which was placed in the operator's cabin. Because
no RFID equipment with wireless communication with the
antenna is available, the antenna was placed on the windshield
of the operator's cabin and attached to the reader using an RF
cable, and the tags were mounted at the center of one of the long
sides of the piece. The operator's cabin and the center of the
long sides of a piece were observed to be approximately in line
with each other both horizontally (Fig. 7a) and in elevation
(Fig. 7b), most of the time during which a piece is being carried
by the crane. This alignment would ensure that the tag attached
to the piece is in the range of the reader.
Based on the relative locations of the tag and reader in the
prototype setup, and the topography of the storage yard, the
practical required reading range was identified as approximately
between 0.3 m and 6 m–8 m to be able to read the piece that is
on the far side of the crane (Fig. 7a). The tags were UHF active
tags with a battery of 5 years of lifetime and a LED that can be
flashed as the corresponding ID is read. The tags were hung
loosely at the edge of the flange of each piece opposite its center
using plastic wire and tape. The GPS receiver was placed on the
picking bar using its magnetic mount and it communicated with
the laptop using a Bluetooth connection.
4.3. Prototype application
A prototype application was developed to demonstrate how
the system proposed in this research will: (1) communicate with
the GPS receiver and RFID reader to acquire coordinates and
tag ID data, (2) identify the tag ID that belongs to the piece that
is picked, (3) determine the location of the pieces that are
moved, and (4) store the new location with the ID of the piece
that is moved in a database. During prototype implementation,
two reasoning methods were developed. The first was for
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367 363

Fig. 10. The user interface of the prototype application for creating a geo-referenced map.

identifying the piece that is picked up by the crane, and the
second was for identifying which stack and row the piece was
placed in. The application that integrates GPS and RFID
information was developed in Visual Basic .NET.
4.3.1. Identifying a piece that is relocated
This method was developed to identify a piece that is re-
located in the storage yard. It filters all of the IDs that are
detected in the environment as they come within the range of the
reader to identify which among them belongs to the piece that is
moved. The method is based on the observation that only the ID
of the piece carried appears in all readings performed as it is
being transported by the crane, while readings of all the other
piece IDs are transient.
The method requires that reading the tags within the proximity
of the reader must start as a piece is picked up by the crane and
continue frequently (every 2 s) as the piece is carried to another
stack. Reading stops when the piece is lowered onto its new
location. Once the piece is released, the proportional occurrence
of each ID in the total number of readings is calculated, and the ID
with the highest occurrence rate is identified as belonging to the
piece being picked up. Possible limitations of this approach and
how it is overcome are explained in the following paragraphs.
An example can be seen in Fig. 8, where piece 421 is carried
by a mobile crane from stack C to stack A. As piece 421 is picked
up, the reader detects it and also piece 103 (which is in the same
stack) and pieces 422 and 424 (which are behind it). As the crane
carries piece 421 to stack A, the reader on the crane detects

Fig. 11. The user interface of the prototype application for collecting ID and location information for a relocated piece.
364 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367

Fig. 12. Picture and plan view of the test area.

pieces 101 and 102 as well as piece 421. Similar behavior is
observed along the way as seen in Fig. 8. Finally, when piece 421
is lowered onto stack A, the reader detects piece 100, which is in
the same stack. At this point, the method calculates that ID 421
had a 100% occurrence rate, while all others were less than 100%
and thus identifies 421 as the piece carried.
The method overcomes two possible exceptions that could
occur due to possible obstructions or interferences in the envi-
ronment. The first occurs when no IDs are detected during a
reading. In this case, the reading is ignored. The second ex-
ception occurs when the piece that is picked up is not detected in
isolated readings due to random obstructions or interferences. In
this case, the rate of occurrence of the piece carried is less than
100%, but still significantly higher than that for other pieces.
Conceivably, in rare cases where the occurrence rate of some
other piece or pieces is less than a user-calibrated threshold rate,
the crane operator can be asked to flash the tag (perform a single
reading) to visually identify the tag and confirm that it belongs to
the piece that was carried.
4.3.2. Determining the location of a piece
This approach is developed to determine the location of a piece
in the storage yard in terms of aisle and row numbers. In the field
test case, the storage yard is divided into aisles and aisles are
divided into rows. In each row, there are two stacks, where pieces
are stacked on top of each other. In the current practice, the piece
locations are tracked by aisle and row only; stack numbers are not
recorded. Nevertheless, in order to explore the boundaries of the
prototype system, the tests were setup to attempt identification of
location at the level of the stack position.
In this method, a geo-referenced map of the storage yard is
created once, and then used to identify locations of the piece by
comparing the coordinates received from the GPS with those in
the geo-referenced map. To generate the geo-referenced map,
 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
the user collects data at two opposite corners of each stack. The
method then calculates and stores the middle point and corner
points of each stack. Once a geo-referenced map is created for a
storage yard, it is used to identify the stack in which a piece is
placed. This is done by comparing the GPS data collected to the
geo-referenced map each time a piece is relocated. Since some
inaccuracy exists in the GPS device, this comparison is per-
formed by finding the distance between the current location of
the piece to each stack, and identifying the stack that is the
closest to the location of the piece, as illustrated in Fig. 9.
4.3.3. User interface
The user interfaces implemented for the prototype are shown
in Figs. 10 and 11. The first interface enables calibration of the
geo-referenced map of the storage yard (Fig. 10). To collect
stack coordinates, the user stands at the first corner, enters the
stack name and clicks on the “refresh” button. Once the inco-
ming GPS coordinate readings converge to stable numbers (i.e.,
when the difference in the fourth digit after the decimal point
varies less than 3), the user confirms capture of the first corner
and progresses to the opposite corner. The procedure is repeated
for all the stacks in the yard.
The second interface screen (Fig. 11) was developed to enable
the crane operator to trigger identification of a piece that is
relocated and to collect its new location data. This interface is
only applicable in the prototype: in a commercial application, the
triggering action would be automated. For example, a load sensor
on the crane can be used to issue “start and stop reading” signals
to the GPS and RFID sub-systems when the load is lifted or when
it is released, thus obviating the need for any user action at all.
5. Field tests and results
The prototype system was tested in a real-life scenario, in
which a piece was picked up by a mobile gantry crane and carried
to another location. A person in the operator's cabin collected and
recorded the ID and location information of the piece using the
prototype application. The gantry crane is a critical resource for
the precast company since precast components can only be
relocated by gantry cranes. Also, operating cost of the crane is
high. Thus, the crane was available for a day for the test.
The worker, who operated the crane, hooked and unhooked
the precast components to/from the crane. In the process of
moving one component from one location to another, the
worker climbed down the crane and up to the stack to hook the
component to the crane and repeated the same steps to unhook
the component. Including the set-up and initial testing time, the
test could be repeated 18 times in one day.
A densely populated area of the double-tee storage yard was
chosen as the test location to test the effect of tags attached to
other pieces in close proximity with the precast component that
will be moved (Fig. 12). In preparation for the tests, the GPS
coordinates for the stacks in the test area (shown shaded in Fig.
12b) were retrieved and stored in a database. The hardware was
installed on the crane as shown in Fig. 6, and eight tags were
attached to eight pieces in the test area. Six of those eight tags
were attached to the pieces at the top of each stack. One of the
365
tags was attached to the piece that was to be picked up, and the
last one was attached to the piece at the second highest level in
the stack immediately behind the piece that was to be picked up.
Eighteen relocations of components were performed and they
involved three types of moves (Fig. 12a): (1) three same-row
moves as a piece is moved from one stack to another one in the
same row, (2) six adjacent-row moves as a piece is moved from
one stack to another in an adjacent row, (3) nine adjacent-aisle
moves as a piece is moved from one aisle to an adjacent aisle. As
explained earlier, same-row relocations are not tracked in current
practice. The three type 1 moves (as defined above) were
included to explore the boundaries of the prototype system.
The results of the tests are given in Table 1. The prototype was
100% successful when identifying the piece during all 15
adjacent-row or adjacent-aisle moves, but of the three same-row
moves, only in one instance could the piece ID be identified. In the
other two instances, there were no false-negatives in the list, and
the user was able to correctly select the piece ID from the short-
list. This result was expected for the same row move, because,
unlike the other moves, in the same-row move, the crane is
stationary; only the picking bar that holds the piece moves from
one end of the crane to the other. Since the lack of wireless
communication between the RFID antenna and reader in the
prototype prevented mounting the antenna on the picking bar,
reader was attached to the crane itself. Therefore, the tags in the
range of the reader do not change during relocation of the piece
unless other tags on other pieces are blocked by the carried piece.
During the evaluation of the test results related to the location
of the components, if the identified location of a component was
in the same aisle and row as the actual location of the component,
this result was considered acceptable. Of the 18 relocations, 61%
were identified within the acceptable limits. This was due to the
inaccuracies associated with the inexpensive GPS used in the test
and cloudy and stormy weather, which might block the GPS
signals, during the test. Utilizing a GPS with sub-meter accuracy,
installing a reference base station for correcting the GPS readings,
are expected to solve this problem.
6. Evaluation of the prototype system
The first and second high-level requirements for an auto-
mated precast tracking system stated that data collection should
Table 1
Field test results
Move type Number RFID tag readings GPS location results
of tests
Correct List of Exact Same Next
ID possible row aisle
IDs (∼ 5 m) (∼ 15 m)
1. Same row 3 1 2 – 1 2
2. Adjacent row 6 6 – 1 3 2
3. Adjacent aisle 9 9 – 5 1 3
Acceptable results 18 16 (89%) 11 (61%)
(all moves)
Acceptable results 15 15 (100%) 10 (66%)
(move types
2 and 3)
366 E. Ergen et al. / Automation in Construction 16 (2007) 354–367
require minimal or no user action. In the prototype system, the
crane operator is required to press several buttons in the user
interface in the crane cabin to collect ID and location data. No
other data collection activities, such as climbing on top of a
stack or walking along rows to scan barcodes, or manual data
entry, are needed. In a production system, the RFID and GPS
subsystems could also be integrated with a load sensor placed
on the crane to eliminate the activities of the crane operator for
data collection, thus achieving a fully automated system.
The third requirement stated that the accuracy with which a
piece is identified and located shall be higher than possible with
the current system. The piece was identified semi-automatically
in all cases and fully automatically in cases where the crane was
not stationary. If the reader was placed closer to the tags (e.g., on
the picking bar), and the reading range was limited accordingly
to read only the tag on the piece, fully automated reliable
identification could be achieved also for the cases where the
crane does not move. The location was identified with 61%
success for relocations that are currently tracked in the system.
The failure of the location identification would probably be
corrected using a GPS with better accuracy, and by combining
the approach with tag ID and signal strength data in the envi-
ronment to increase the confidence.
The fourth requirement related to the need for consistent
performance under harsh construction conditions and in the
presence of metal and concrete. Both the RFID tags and GPS
were designed for harsh environments, and no problems were
observed in terms of receiving the signals from RFID tags and
GPS unit in the field conditions. Apart from a small number of
individual readings, the RFID tag of the piece that was carried
could be consistently detected in the required range.
7. Conclusions
The field tests demonstrated the basic feasibility of an
automated system that integrates RFID and GPS technologies
for tracking precast pieces in a storage yard. The prototype
system used for the tests had all the features of the conceptual
system, with three exceptions: the RFID antenna was mounted
on the crane cabin rather than on the picking bar in close
proximity to the piece centers, the GPS used did not meet the
minimal accuracy requirement, and user intervention was re-
quired to activate the readers of both subsystems.
Despite these restrictions, the prototype system was suc-
cessful in semi-automatically identifying all of the pieces that
were relocated. The reading range of the RFID tags was
reduced to 1/4th–1/5th of the nominal reading range for open
air environments; however, this reading range was still
sufficient for the precast tracking case. Mounting a wireless
antenna on the picking bar, and using a load sensor to activate
reading, would enable the system to operate fully automatically
in all cases.
Analysis of the location information shows that approxi-
mately 60% of the location information was within the accept-
able limits. The low success rate was attributed to inaccuracies
of the inexpensive GPS that was used in this test. No per-
formance reduction was observed due to the presence of metal
or concrete in the environment, even while using Bluetooth
communication. Utilizing a GPS with sub-meter accuracy or
installing a base station for correcting the GPS readings (using
differential GPS technology) are expected to increase the rate of
successful location identification.
In the prototype system, data collection activities did not
require any change to the current storage process (except requi-
ring the operator to press buttons to activate data the readers).
Moreover, all data collection activities previously required, such
as scanning a barcode or manually entering data to the database
system, were eliminated.
In the short term, similar tests should be conducted to collect
more data points and further research should focus on refining
the prototype system as suggested, to further validate the hypo-
thesis that a fully automated and reliable system is feasible. In
the long term, application of the same concept to monitoring of
precast pieces at the construction site should also be explored.
Acknowledgments
This work was partially funded by High Concrete and the
Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute (PCI). The authors grate-
fully acknowledge this sponsorship. The authors also great-
lyappreciate the assistance and support received from High
Concrete.
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Esin Ergen is an Assistant Professor at the Civil Engineering Department at
Istanbul Technical University. Her research interests are information flow in
construction supply chains and application of advanced tracking and data storage
technologies to improve the information flow process.
Burcu Akinci is Associate Professor at the Department of Civil and Environmental
Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research area is information-rich
history of a project and a facility supported by emerging sensing and data capture
technologies. Her web address is bhttp://www.ce.cmu.edu/∼bakinci/N.
Rafael Sacks is a Senior Lecturer at Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engi-
neering at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. His research interests are
information technology enabled process change in civil engineering design and
construction, building information modeling and automated building systems. His
web address is bhttp://www.technion.ac.il/∼cvsacks/N.