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About The Last Minute:
Engineers always give you drawings in the final moments before a deadline. I’ve started to tell them their drawings are due days before. –Maverick
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Architexts
A webcomic about architectural professionals
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Happens EVERY time!
That’s strange. I assumed that if architects actually wanted the enginering drawings done on time, they would have gotten the layouts to the engineers more than a couple of days before the drawings were due.
I have to agree with Mech. Strange how we can get a completely revised building plan from the architects a week before the deadline, yet the deadline doesn’t move. Yet if the architect has problems getting their stuff finished, the deadline will constantly jump to be be 3 days away from today. We had to start giving architects deadlines to give us finalized plans. I’m tired of getting revised backgrounds at 5pm the day before a deadline.
Ya, last week we got the arch’s ‘final’ background the morning the plots were due …. our contract does state that final layouts are due two weeks prior to our MEP delivery, but sometimes we have to be ‘team players’ for the ‘good of the job’ … and the architect’s reputation. In return, we get to be the scapegoat at meetings to which we are pointedly NOT invited.
… ah the constant conflict between Architects and Engineers. It’s almost as good as the conflict between the G.C. and the Architect!
Bottom line no matter what side of the fence your on, there’s always an unrealistic deadline to be met with the inevitable plan change hours before the submittal and everyone is always running behind. If the construction goes well and project stays in budget then the G.C. is the hero and the design team gets another project with that client.
I work in a full service A/E firm and when we want the MEP drawings completed on time we just do them ourselves in the ARCHITECTURAL Dept.!!!!!! It is really amazing how true these story lines are.
We had a client once that sent updated bases at least four times a week for several months. Even setting that extreme example aside, we do routinely get background changes dropped in our laps at the last minute. It is *very* hard to update bases, find the hidden changes that nobody ever bothers to mention, change all our drawings (across multiple trades) to coordinate with those changes, and finish what we were doing in the first place.
Solstice, who seals the MEP drawings that you produce in the architectural department?
We tell our engineers that the drawings are due at least 3 days before the actual milestone date as a standard practice.
I have no issue with delivering drawings to an architect a couple days before they assemble their set – *if* they tell me in advance, and *if* they recognize that changes they make during those days aren’t going to be picked up in my drawings. We’ve had clients hold us to a tight deadline and then sit on the job for three weeks before doing anything with our drawings or telling us that the drawings haven’t been issued, though, and that’s a little bit frustrating.
Maybe the Electrical was coordinating all this stuff with the Plumbing and echanical (often all in the same office) so there wouldn’t be any conflicts and change orders in the field… unlike all of my projects.
Hey gonk, Sorry for the delayed response, but IF, and I do mean IF one of the MEP partners are around we just TELL one of them to stamp and sign. If not, we just grab one of their stamps and have the President of the company (an ARCHITECT) Hancock them.
It’s not like these engineers even look at the drawings before they go out whether somebody in MEP does the drawings or NOT!!! Have GREAT weekend EVERYONE…
Ummm…. Yikes? Two problems.
First, for an engineer to stamp drawings that he or she hasn’t actually been involved in the production of is a form of plan-stamping, which is technically a violation of the rules – at least in the states I’m registered in. If you were to tell me to stamp drawings I hadn’t ever seen, I would tell you take a long walk off a short pier.
Second, it’s a stretch for an architect to stamp engineering drawings, unless that architect also knows enough about electrical design, HVAC design, and/or plumbing design to vouch for the work on the plans. If an architect is signing an ENGINEER’s seal (not his own), that’s a flat-out rules violation and could get either the engineer, the architect, or both sanctioned by the state board. If an architect (even the president of my firm) signed my seal onto a drawing that I hadn’t worked on, I’d turn him in to the board and quit on the spot.
It sounds like your engineering department is either understaffed or has some other issues beyond the normal day-to-day hassles of our industry.