A device for time-based tracking and
cost optimization in construction projects, the device comprising the following: a robust housing suitable for use on construction sites; a
processing unit located inside the housing, configured to perform real-time time-
stamping,
data acquisition and preprocessing tasks; a multimodal sensor unit that is operationally coupled with the
processing unit, wherein the sensor unit comprises at least a motion sensor, an RFID reader, sensors for environmental conditions and a vision module with
optical character recognition; a real-time
clock module that is operationally connected to the
processing unit to provide
time synchronization for all sensor data streams; a
wireless communication module that supports the Wi-Fi, LoRa and LTE protocols and is configured for transmitting time-stamped data to a central project
server; a storage module that is operationally coupled with the processing unit to locally buffer
time series data of construction activity during offline operation; a housing-mounted,
touchscreen-based human-
machine interface configured to allow site personnel to enter activity updates and confirm the status of construction tasks; a
cost optimization engine running on the central
server, the engine being configured to receive time-synchronized sensor data from multiple such devices and dynamically calculate time-cost trade-offs using a predictive planning technique that incorporates the principles of the critical path and the power value; furthermore, the device is configured to be integrated into a digital twin environment of the
building under construction in order to provide real-time
visualization of progress and to generate suggestions for
resource reallocation based on a time-cost-
benefit analysis.