What do I look out for in an ‘as built drawings’ being demanded from my electrical contractor?
Thursday, August 14th, 2008 at
8:12 am
@@.carlo asked:
I expect to see all cables and cable path as laid in the building. Are the cable specs. and colour codings necessary. Please I need all the necessary informations that need to be indicated on the drawings before accepting it. Thanks.
Tagged with: Cable Specs • Drawings • Necessary Informations
Filed under: Engineering
Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!
brighton electrics
The contractor will do as little as possible. Most of the time as-built drawings are the original drawings with field notes and marks to indicate what was changed. Unless there is language in the contract for anything else, you are not likely to get it.
sussex electrical
Now is not really the time to be considering this. When you hired the contractor, you should have laid out the conditions for the contract. That way they could have quoted based on the work needed to comply. They may have had to hire a draughtsman to turn out the drawing which would have cost (you) money. If you just accepted a general contract, it would not have included drawings.
brighton electrical
As-built-drawings are commonly defined in industry as a last revision to the construction drawings after the construction is complete. This revision incorporates all field changes made in the construction process and not documented by previous drawing revisions.
The only way this can really be done is for someone to keep a record of these changes or additions in the field. If this type of record does not exist, then you are not likely to get a true set of as-built drawings no matter what you ask for.
I have worked as a field construction engineer and I know how it works (or doesn’t work). There is little incentive for the contractor to put much effort into as-built drawings. They have essentially done their job and they want to move on to the next project. Unless there has been a significant retainage of funds, you will never get much more than a token effort.
sussex electrician
As has been pointed out, if you didn’t specify exactly what you wanted in the contract, you won’t get it. However, you have a right to get whatever drawings the contractor used, and they should show the location of lights and outlets and switches, and the routing of wires, and some specifications of the cable types used. If you are diplomatic you may get the contractor to sit down and mark up the drawings with any changes that he is aware of that were made during the wiring, but he probably won’t have any record other than memory. Still, this will be useful to have later when you need to repair or rewire something.
sussex electrician
In addition to what you mentioned, the drawings shall include the tag numbers of the cables and panels, all the details of the panel must be spelled out correctly.
Vendors list shall be given for future reference,
Line diagrams shall indicate power ratings properly