Engineering Project Management

Eng. Imad Zreid

Precedence Diagram Method (PDM) Example 1

Activity A B C D E

Preceded by
A A C B,D

Duration 4 3 2 5 2

1- Forward Pass ( calculating Earliest Start and Earliest Finish)

2- Backward Pass ( calculating Latest Start and Latest Finish)

Engineering Project Management

Eng. Imad Zreid

3- Float calculation ( calculating Total Float and Free Float) Activity Total Float (TF) = Activity LS Activity ES = Activity LF Activity EF Free Float (FF) = min. ES of Activitys successors Activity EF Activity A TF = LS- ES = 0 0 = 0 FFi = ESj Efi = 4 4 = 0 Activity B TF = LS- ES = 8 4 = 4 FFi = ESj Efi = 11 7 = 4 Activity C TF = LS- ES = 4 4 = 0 FFi = ESj Efi = 6 6 = 0 Similarly you can calculate floats for the other activities.

Example 2
Draw PDM , complete the table ,and determine the critical Path
START Duration 3 2 5 3 12 5 18 3 0 ES LS EF FINISH LF FF TF

Activity A B C D E F G H

Preceded by
A A B,C D E,D G

Engineering Project Management

Eng. Imad Zreid

Solution

Engineering Project Management

Eng. Imad Zreid

Exercise 1
Draw PDM and calculate activities times and floats. Determine the critical path.
Activity A B C D E F

Preceded by
A,B A,B A,B C,D,E

Duration 8 4 3 8 5 5

Ans. Project duration = 21 day, critical Path : A-D-F

Exercise 2
Draw PDM and calculate activities times and floats. Determine the critical path.
Activity A B C D E F G H I J K Duratio n 3 2 4 5 3 6 4 5 7 2 5

Preceded by
A A B E E C,D,F H,G H I,G

Ans. Project duration = 28 day, critical Path : B-E-F-H-I-K