Old N Rusty Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 Yesterday a project manager sent an assistant to my shop with a sketch, of a job they wanted me to quote. Some essential details like plate thickness, and hole sizes were not shown, and the assistant could only guess at the dimensions. I told him i could draw it as i inteneded to make it, and would E mail the proposal to them with my plans, Why is this happening? what ever happened to real blueprints with a check off box bottom right and are complete before sending out for bid? Quote
macbruce Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 It's called progress...................:lol: Quote
JNewman Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 Drawings?? you still get drawings?? Most of the things I get in to quote come in by computer. Sometimes they are pdfs of drawings but often they are CAD 3d models. I then have to use a CAD program to find the dimensions. The information is all there but it often takes a lot to dig it out of the model. Quote
Old N Rusty Posted June 17, 2011 Author Posted June 17, 2011 Are you paid for detailing their project? Or are you clarifying their next trip down the road for the cheapest? Quote
HWHII Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 Most lot of the drawings that were recieved by the company I used to work for came in this way. They were CAD drawings,sent in a file like mentioned earlier, but really no information on them, called bid drawings. Then they were looked at by project managers who are engineers and assigned a price to bid. If the bid was excepted then the project went to in house detailing for shop drawings. Then sent back to the client for OK to fabricate stamp. Some of my friends who have small busineses have to pay for outside detailers to do CAD drawings for OK to fabricate approval. It seems this is the way it is done now. They were actually talking about a lap tops on the shop floor for lead men to read prints from rather than paper prints. Quote
ianinsa Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 What makes it really fun is whan your client in the middle east sends you a picture of a gate at Buckingham palace or somesuch and a picture of the walls at his villa some where and askes you for a similar gate "but different, maybe more gold acsents,I think" and sized to suit."will you do an autocad drawing for my Architect to aprove and send your price to the project manager" And this is how many work. When you have done the drawings the architect wants hinge details etc.before they apoint you. Ian Quote
teenylittlemetalguy Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 I deal in the electrical construction trade, specifically lighting. The same thing is now common in construction circles, it is called "Design-Build" it is MUCH cheaper for the buyer and a pain for everyone else, but it can get a savvy guy in the door. By savvy, I mean one that can take every possible short cut. When specifications are called out clearly the guys that win are the one ones with some seemingly small exceptions in the owners eyes, but ones that make the job profitable for them.(ie- don't pass all the savings along.) If the specs are not clear, then everyone just beats themselves up so the owner saves money, unless you plan on building the extra cheap stinking pile the owner is asking for by going with the design build concept in the first place. If you go into them you must have a good plan on how to cheapen the bottom line for the owner, otherwise don't waste your money designing it. Really helpful to know your competition in these situations as well, nothing worse than undercutting too far and not making as much money. Quote
JNewman Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 Are you paid for detailing their project? Or are you clarifying their next trip down the road for the cheapest? No they don't want a dimensioned drawing back, the CAD model is all they produce and ever expect to see. I just quoted a complicated job that I got a drawing with about 4 dimensions on it and a CAD model. Because of the way they had modeled it I could not get many dimensions off the model. I quoted the job based on them providing a dimensioned drawing. Unfortunately many new engineers do not know how to properly dimension a drawing because they are taught in school that everything will be made on a CNC machine. Quote
Old N Rusty Posted June 17, 2011 Author Posted June 17, 2011 I. T. has succeded in making their profession indispensable. I don't even want to ask what CAD means, since I have not even mastered posting pics on IFI, I will stay at the forge and make what I want to. Quote
lordcaradoc Posted June 17, 2011 Posted June 17, 2011 I. T. has succeded in making their profession indispensable. I don't even want to ask what CAD means, since I have not even mastered posting pics on IFI, I will stay at the forge and make what I want to. CAD stands for Computer Aided Design. Regards, Tim Quote
Sask Mark Posted June 18, 2011 Posted June 18, 2011 I'm an estimator for a very large construction company. I look at drawings all day every day. We deal with commercial, institutional, civil and industrial construction. The quality of the documents are going down on a daily basis. In talking to the designers, they tell me that a lot of the drawings are drawn up by junior technologists with the lead designer giving them a very cursory glance for approval. The 'designers' only design the concept now and the junior staff with no building experience (just knowledge of the software) are the ones producing the documents. I find it frustrating that the contract documents put the onus on the bidders to inform the consultants/designers of errors and ommissions in the documents. Who is preparing the bid package here? Who is responsible for design? It is not uncommon for larger jobs to see almost 10 addendum during the tender period to correct errors and clarify documents in the tender package. Some of these addenda can be a few hundred pages each. It definitely makes my job more challenging that it should be (and not in the 'good challenging' way). Quote
John B Posted June 18, 2011 Posted June 18, 2011 CAD stands for Computer Aided Design. Regards, Tim Thanks for that I was thinking Cheap And Disappointing Quote
pkrankow Posted June 18, 2011 Posted June 18, 2011 Thanks for that I was thinking Cheap And Disappointing Can be. I was the last class to be taught mechanical drawing in college. I do remember how to change views on paper, although the odd ones take some time for remembering. The flip side of this coin is also dissapointing because without training in CAD it is rather hard to gain employment in certain fields. Phil Quote
ianinsa Posted June 18, 2011 Posted June 18, 2011 Autocad(new versions) is never cheap yet frequently disapointing--- The product is great, but to get the cad operators/draughtsmen/women to understand that the dims are way more important than drawing the slots in the screws is a mission and a half Ian Quote
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