Advise for dealing with an unreasonable engineer 23

[RontheRedneck]

I had a conference with a GC, architect, and engineers on a project. It came in over budget, and the GC asked for some VE (value engineering) suggestions. Not an unusual thing - Happens all the time.

I wrote out what I thought. Several things that were called for were totally unnecessary. I referenced section numbers on the drawings and explained what I was suggesting.

The engineer shot down pretty much everything. They lied about what was "structurally necessary".

So we're going to charge more to do it their way, as it will cost more to get the job done. The owner of the building is going to pay for what they want, even though they're absolutely clueless.

In a way I guess it's no skin off my back - I don't have to pay for it. The situation just bugs me. I feel like the owners are being taken advantage of.

Before you ask - No, I'm not going to get into specifics of what they want. If I did you'd just debate details instead of the situation.

I do trusses for buildings like this about every 2 weeks, and have been in the truss business for close to 40 years. So it's not like I don't know what I'm talking about or am just guessing.


Since you guys are all from a vastly different perspective than I am - What would you suggest that I do?

 

[XR250]

Why aren't y'all getting paid for the VE? Seems you need better contracts.

 

[Just Some Nerd]

I hope it is not lost on anyone here that electing to dig in your heels at the first sign of questioning is exactly what the other engineer is being accused of.

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Why yes, I do in fact have no idea what I'm talking about

 

[Aesur]

Why aren't y'all getting paid for the VE? Seems you need better contracts.

You may or may not be surprised at how often scope creep happens and you don't get add services regardless of contract wording. I have started specifically writing exactly what I am doing, down to the actual building systems and specifically excluding certain items, like design of PEMB walls (in my area certain jurisdictions refuse to allow standard PEMB metal panel walls, so we end up with stucco or some other system which they won't do). Most of the time, the architect will claim there is no additional money available for the add services, and it's honestly hit or miss if you can actually get it and keep the client. Those clients were needed during the startup phase, but they are seeing greater resistance to just giving "free" engineering.

 

[dik]

For the last three years I've been designing connections for metal fabricators and occasionally come across details that just don't work, or that could be done better. Even with clients, I sometimes add a note... for example, on a bunch of stairs, recently, all the 3/4" bolts could be replaced with 1/2... they go with 3/4"... just cannot figure it out. There are a bunch of examples. I still keep noting them.

-----*****-----
So strange to see the singularity approaching while the entire planet is rapidly turning into a hellscape. -John Coates

-Dik

 

[hokie66]

They just don't want to keep different size bolts on site. I wouldn't.

 

[wrantler]

Like Hookie I try and keep things consistent. It keeps things simple in construction which saves time/labour. The savings in material usually are tiny compared to labour in my area of work.

I get comments back sometimes that my 15M @ 150mm c/c could be 200mm c/c. Which technically is true. But its much easier and simpler to keep all my rebar spacings consistent (say 150/300 or 200/400 pairings for example). I could spec tons of custom spacings to save rebar but it really just leads to confusion in construction.

So sometimes my numbers might be slightly conserv but there is a reason to my madness.. I try and be a good businessman and not just a number crunching enginerd.

 

[LittleInch]

Ron,

The easiest thing in consulting engineering is throwing rocks at someone else's design when you have no skin in the game. "Well if it was me I wouldn't have done it that way" is the essence of your approach to this as far as I can see. Now for the engineer, change represents a whole heap of money that the client probably won't pay for and in the engineers mind, ho or she has designed it correctly.

"Several things that were called for were totally unnecessary." Hmmm. I hope you can see that that sort of attitude, whether expressed in words or not probably didn't help and in all likelihood came across during the conversation. Maybe next time thinking. "In my opinion and experience there is another way that this could be designed which results in lower cost for materials and construction. Have you considered doing it this way or using this size / type of truss instead?"

"They lied about what was "structurally necessary". Now indeed they may have, but they would probably argue that this was THEIR opinion, design and experience and they are the ones taking responsibility for the design. It could be (you don't say) that the engineer responsible was not experienced or was used to different structures and loads and hadn't really "sharpened his pencil", but now needed to stick to his design to avoid a whole load of pain.

Now this might need airing BEFORE such a meeting but at some point someone needs to say "Of course that may need some additional design work but overall the cost will be lower so Mr Client / GC, would you be willing to pay for these changes or review of the design?".

So what would I suggest?

This boat has sailed, but for the next boat try to see a little more the other viewpoint and leave the ego outside the room. You might be right, you might be wrong, but in design there is rarely only one way to do things. Ultimately the designers who create designs which are cheaper but still don't fall down should get more work. also maybe hint that next time if they called you DURING the design or as the design was progressing, you could both work together to achieve the same outcome, but at lower cost.



Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

 

[GeorgeTheCivilEngineer]

I feel like the owners are being taken advantage of.

Unless the engineer is getting a kickback from these unnecessary things then that isn't really the case. They might have an over-designed building but as long as it still provides value it isn't taking advantage of anyone.

One thing I feel I need to point out to contractors is that the engineer is responsible for making the building be safe for decades into the future. Yes, a skinnier design would work in the short term but our design needs to consider a lot of potential future failure points. Not an insurance issue (I'm relatively young but I'm already unlikely to be around for the end of life for most of my designs), but an ethical one.

 

[Eng16080]

I was really hoping this would turn into a meaningful discussion where I might gain some insights into providing better structural designs with prefab. wood trusses. Oh well.

 

[phamENG]

It would seem that I touched a nerve with some of you.

We've all been in that engineer's shoes. It's not a comfortable place to be. A project with VE at the end of design is a project gone wrong. The truss designer should be consulted as soon as preliminary drawings are developed to get their opinion, and cost reduction measures should be taken from the start. Whether there's a 'design to' clause in the contract or not, nearly all owners expect the design to come in under budget and ahead of schedule and are unwilling to pay the design team more to get it there. So once we're in that seat, we're faced with two issues:

1) Personal - the quasi-unique mixture of personality traits that it takes to produce somebody who is capable of being both a good engineering AND a successful business person almost always leaves the person with an ego. Some of us can put it aside, some of us can't (or won't). So that engineer has to get over their professional opinion being questioned. This is where my previous comment about helping them come to your conclusion "on their own" helps to by-pass this. Aesur's expansion on the idea is really good, and I've used similar techniques with success as well.

2) Business - The budget for the project was likely used up months ago. The engineer is probably fuming about being at the meeting because they couldn't get the architect to agree to pay for it. If the meeting results in any additional work, they know they have an argument on their hands just to get additional fee to redesign it, and if they don't then they'll be doing it for free. Not a comfortable place to be, especially if you have a backlog of paid work that people are screaming about and you have to put them aside to redo this other job.

The cost/benefit relationship between an engineer's fee and the efficiency of the design is analogous to a square root function; or, at least, that's how it should be. Pay us a little, and you get an inefficient design. Pay us more, and the efficiency goes up. Eventually, that money is just going into iterative analysis that's just getting us closer and closer to the same answer and each hour of engineer is only saving a few nails through the house. So there's a point where it doesn't make sense to pay more, but most residential jobs are well down on the curve, and all we can do is spit out a floor plan with a framing plan that works (though maybe not the most efficient), a foundation plan (with typical, not optimized foundations with 30% more concrete than is needed), and a slew of typical details that will work in nearly every situation but maybe overkill for this house.

Such is the market we work in. That "structurally necessary" comment probably has the unspoken caveat "without paying me to spend 3 days developing an alternative design."


But Ron, it would be nice - maybe in another thread? - if you did go into some specifics. Clearly there is something here that we can probably learn from. Many of us were really excited when you showed up on this forum. No, you're not an engineer in the 'legal' sense but you certainly have a wealth of design knowledge in metal plate connected trusses, an area that most engineers don't understand nearly as well as we should. I understand that you are asking us for help in this thread, and hopefully we've been able to do so...please reciprocate that and help us in another thread learn what mistakes you feel this engineer is making and how we can avoid them. Thanks.

 

[Rabbit12]

Cliff notes of the first post:

I'm smarter than a damn engineer because I've been in the business 40 years.

And then there is surprise when some engineers get a bit defensive when there is no detail at all in the first post to ascertain what the real situation is.

I agree with Pham it would be nice to hear some details.

 

[ThomasH]

Ron,

You mention your 40 years experience with trusses. How much experience (approximately) does the engineer in question have? Just to understand if there is a lack of experience from their side.

Are the trusses in this project something that isn't within you experience after all? Even if you won't go inte specifics, is it normal trusses with normal loads and no other specific function in a structural context?

I think it would be a better discussion if you could explain things better. Because the current description of the situation is very subjective.

 

[AZPete]

First attempt at getting desired feedback having stalled, try throwing in some of the specifics that were intentionally avoided. In all likelihood, you will get your answer in a roundabout way, as the engineers will stand in for the subject engineer and reproduce his stance or confirm your stance.

 

[XR250]

t's honestly hit or miss if you can actually get it and keep the client. Those clients were needed during the startup phase, but they are seeing greater resistance to just giving "free" engineering.

Not sure why you want a client who expects free engineering and does not value what you bring to the table.
Part of being in the race to the bottom I suppose.

 

[Aesur]

Part of being in the race to the bottom I suppose.

Was part of the original startup, taking any client you could, hence why I said I am starting to push back more and more and those clients are being replaced. I agree though, those clients are not worth the headache, learned a lot in the first few years running a company.

 

[JoshPlumSE]

Not sure why you want a client who expects free engineering and does not value what you bring to the table.

I think you missed the point of Aesur's post. His post was really related to the concept of having to be careful with how he (or she) writes their company's contracts. Being very specific to eliminate items that have bitten them in the past.

My guess is that (if the OP's comments were related to truss design) then KootK hit on something specific. A lot of time Truss design doesn't consider any design of lateral forces and you can use the bottom chords as drag struts or collectors for the lateral force resisting system. If the engineer knows that he's going to use some trusses like this, he likely includes those forces in the package he sends to the truss designer.

If this were the case, I would hope that the engineer would (at some phase) be capable of telling the truss manufacturer which trusses will be used as drag struts / collectors. Though it's certainly possible that the engineer has been bitten by that problem before and doesn't want to provide that information until his design is more completed. Especially for projects where the Architect is likely to change locations of shear walls or such.

 

[dik]

Their work can use a single bolt size... not a matter of two different ones. Some steel fabricators don't mind using 3/4 and 1/2... depends on the fabricator. With stairs, the loads are small and the entire assembly can use the smaller bolt.

-----*****-----
So strange to see the singularity approaching while the entire planet is rapidly turning into a hellscape. -John Coates

-Dik

 

[Huevo]

I'll share an anecdote.

I had a delegated designer say a lot of negative things about the design that I had issued right in front of the owner. They didn't know the background of the project or the owner's wishes for the "look". We arranged a lunch meeting later where I approached the meeting with a desire to learn more about their design process and what their concerns entailed. I used it as a learning opportunity for myself. I believe that approach dismantled their defensiveness and we ended up sharing quite a bit of information and we both learned a lot. Years later we still reach out to each other for opinions on unique scenarios.

I don't think it really matters what position or side of the table you are sitting on; find the right venue and approach the engineer with a "what can I learn from this individual" perspective and progress can be made. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know and of course you may find that you were right and they were a bonehead.

 

[Rabbit12]

Huevo, one of the better posts I've read on this site. We all have unique experiences. 40 years of experience in an industry is valuable but that also doesn't mean Ron understands structural design of the rest of the building inside and out. As you say, you don't know what you don't know.

I've lost count how many times I've heard a contractor say things like, "I've been doing it this way for 20 years". Well, you've been doing it wrong for 20 years because torching a hole in a steel beam is not the correct way to do things.

 

[Tomfh]

I get comments back sometimes that my 15M @ 150mm c/c could be 200mm c/c.

That's just rude.