Technical drawing reviewing too time consuming? 15

[Ron88N]

I'm a junior structural engineer with 1.5 years of experience, based in Germany. In my office, we each have to review multiple shop drawings of concrete components every week. The process often feels repetitive and, honestly, a bit demeaning boring, as it mostly involves checking that all components are correctly inserted, referenced, and specified.

Does anyone else find themselves in a similar situation?

Are there any software solutions to help automate or streamline this process? We currently use Bluebeam, but it still feels quite manual.

 

[cliff234]

"....reviewing multiple drawings per week."

You post is vague and incomplete. Please clarify. What kind of drawings are you being asked to review? Structural design drawings or shop drawings? Also, what kind of structures are you designing? Steel? Concrete? Wood? How many years experience do you have? Also, are you in the U.S.?

 

[RPGs]

Can you elaborate on why it's demeaning?

 

[Ron88N]

@cliff234: Thanks for the clarifying questions, I just edited the post to include such information.

@RPGs: I find it kinda demeaning because it feels like a monotonous, low-skill task that doesn’t really utilize any of my (engineering) knowledge. While I understand that accuracy and attention to detail are important, this task mainly involves checking that all components are properly referenced and inserted in the drawings, rather than engaging in design or analysis.

 

[271828]

Checking shop drawings is a repetitive and miserable task. Unfortunately, among that sea of correct items, there are errors. Maybe big errors.

Some people have more tolerance for these types of tasks. Maybe that's not you. LOL. It's not me, either, BTW. If I found myself stuck doing that long term, I would be looking for ways out. I know people who have spent much of their lives checking shop drawings. I don't know what mental tricks they have for staying the game and continuing to look for errors, and not going crazy.

 

[RPGs]

Wow. 1.5 years of experience and still only doing shop drawing review day in, day out? I can sympathize with feeling like it's a bit of a waste of your education and skills to not do ANY design or analysis.

Like 271828, I've met engineers that are OK with that and have no desire to do much else, but if you aren't OK with that it might be time to look at your options. If you like your firm, at a minimum it's time to talk to your supervisor and see if there's a path out of the shop drawing review sweat shop. If you can't get an answer that aligns with your career goals, it may be time to change firms.

I don't know what the job market looks like in Germany, but here in the US, small to mid-size firms seem to have what you're looking for.

I have only worked at small firms and it has been ideal in giving me a wide variety of project experience. I've had my fair share of mind-numbing shop drawing reviews (and there will certainly be many more in my future--it tends to come with the territory), but they are relatively few and far between and sometimes I actually appreciate them as a break from projects that are excruciating design/analysis headaches.

Navigating the structural engineering industry is very challenging, but at a minimum you can take heart that you are doing important work. Best wishes to you.

 

[human909]

I might be misinterpreting the post somewhat due to lack of context or cultural/language barriers. But I'll run with my interpretation and will be happy to backtrack if I've mis-interpretted things.

I'm a junior structural engineer with 1.5 years of experience, based in Germany. In my office, we each have to review multiple shop drawings of concrete components every week. The process often feels repetitive and, honestly, a bit demeaning, as it mostly involves checking that all components are correctly inserted, referenced, and specified.

Does anyone else find themselves in a similar situation?

Demeaning!? How is doing extremely important work demeaning? Do you think you are better/more important than the rest of the people around you? There is plenty of unexciting and undesirable work in all careers and professions. Do you really think a medical doctor is enthusiastic about performing a prostate examination? Lawyers still need to read 100s or 1000s of pages of boring contracts in order to do their due diligence. When you are more senior sometimes you can outsource a large majority of the more mundane tasks to more junior staff, but it never completely disappears.

I am the most senior engineer in the company I work for and I also do work for myself. Yet I also have to review shop drawings at times.


Sure review drawings isn't exciting but if you find it demeaning you either don't understand the meaning of the English word or you have an inflated sense of self importance.
(And with respect to you, maybe you chose the wrong word which is totally understandable as presumably English isn't your primary language.)

 

[cliff234]

I’m not sure about the differences regarding checking shop drawings in the US versus Germany, but here’s my answer to your questions,
Reviewing shop drawings is extremely important. The purpose of shop drawing review is primarily to check that the detailers correctly interpreted your drawings and properly detailed the reinforcing steel and whatever other embeds are in the concrete. But the shop drawing review is also the last chance to catch mistakes on the design drawings. While young engineers are often responsible for reviewing shop drawings, I sometimes joke that shop review should be performed by the most experienced engineers – because this is the last chance to find a major mistake! People have died because of mistakes made by structural engineers and failure to catch those mistakes during shop drawing review. Likewise subtle changes could have been made by the detailer that could result in a failure (Google “Kansas City Hyatt Regency skywalk collapse”. 114 people dead.) There were many reasons that led to that collapse – not just a shop drawing error. If you don’t review the shop drawings, who in your office would review them? The drawings must be reviewed by some who knows what they are looking at.

When reviewing shop drawings, you are not just looking at what is on the drawings. You also have to look for what is missing from the drawings. This is often the hardest part – and it is something that cannot be done by engineers with little experience.

To my knowledge there are no software solutions that will facilitate shop drawing review. When the manufacturers of structural engineering software start making claims that their product uses Artificial Intelligence to save time – BE CAREFUL!!! That will be an exaggeration. A human brain will always (for at least the next 30 years) be required to thoroughly review shop drawings! And for us, that’s a good thing. Otherwise, we could be replaced by robots!
Reviewing shop drawings is NOT demeaning!

I agree with human909. I suspect the English word "demeaning" is not the exact word you were looking for. "Boring" might better describe shop drawing review. That is, until you find a huge mistake that might have slipped by were it not for you being knowledgeable and alert, catching it, and avoiding a major problem!

 

[hokie66]

Drawing checking, whether the design drawings or the shop drawings, is essential. Like cliff's 'joke', I generally think that complex drawings should be checked by experienced engineers. Things like the spliced hangers in the Hyatt walkway and the mislabeled plates in the I35W bridge could/should have been caught if a careful review of the drawings had been conducted.

 

[Ron88N]

Thanks for all the replies! Appreciated
I agree that "demeaning" was a strong or misleading word. I’ve replaced it with "boring," which better describes what I meant.

@cliff234 — Since you mentioned Artificial Intelligence, have you had any negative experiences with AI tools for this task? I imagine that while AI might not fully automate the process, but it could help streamline part of it?

@hokie66 @human909 @cliff234 — I completely agree; this is an important task, and I’m not questioning its value. I was curious to hear if others were in similar situations or if they’ve found better processes or (automation) tools to make it less repetitive.

@RPGs @271828 — You’re right! Exploring a change, whether it’s improving things internally or finding a new opportunity, might be something to consider down the line.

 

[rb1957]

War has been described as 90% boredom and 10% sheer terror.

Engineering could be described the same way, but less extreme (not so much "sheer terror" as "people losing their heads and blaming it on you", so project schedules and budgets disappear, along with the unicorns and fairy princesses).

If the job you're in isn't satisfying (and I've had my share) then change it.

Are you checking just the drafting, important but depressingly dull, or are you also checking compliance to code ?
What can you learn by reviewing drawings (hint, not nothing)?

"Wir hoffen, dass dieses Mal alles gut gehen wird!"
General Paulus, Nov 1942, outside Stalingrad after the launch of Operation Uranus.

 

[a_urbs]

Shop drawings while some are boring (those 300+ page OWSJ packages are one), are also an essential phase/item of any project, as everyone here has mentioned. Also, sometimes it's nice to see other designs and details that you can learn and take inspiration from as well.

I find what's helped me the most when reviewing these is I start with the mindset that there IS a mistake and I have to find it. This puts me in a more engaged headspace rather than passively scrolling and lulling myself into saying it's okay.

More often than not, there is a mistake, and that feeling of finding it is very rewarding.

 

[Eng16080]

To reiterate the consensus above, shop drawing review is a critical part of a project. It's not just busy work. It's the final chance to find an error before parts of the building will be fabricated. The review can bring to light design errors on your part (the EOR), as well as errors by others in interpreting your design. It's also a task which, ideally, wouldn't be left to somebody new at the profession, but rather an experienced engineer with a deep understanding of the project.

While it's important to make clear that your review is only for general conformance with the structural design (or whatever the current recommended wording is from a liability standpoint), I still like to review shop drawings in a rather high level of detail.

I generally don't find the task as terrible as others above, mainly because it is very important. Generally it's good practice to start with a checklist and then meticulously go through the drawings, checking as you go. For more critical items, look closer at those areas. Like the comment above noted, I try to make it a game to see how quickly I can find an error. That seems to make the boredom a little less.

You will be amazed at the errors you find as soon as you start to look close. I can't recall a single time I failed to find something of significance on a shop drawing review. Often I find significant errors! Concerning concrete in particular, on a project several years ago, I noticed that a number of prefab. concrete panels would be fabricated with the inner/outer sides reversed based on the shop drawings. I pointed this out, and yet, somehow, they still were still fabricated incorrectly and then installed backwards! Things still got messed up in this case, but I had the receipts in hand before anybody could even think about trying to pass the blame onto us.

 

[cliff234]

Ron88N – We’ve been using “AI” software since about 1980. Any structural engineering modeling software that analyzes structural framing and designs member is AI software. In the context of today’s use of the term “AI” I think there’s an expectation that the software will do more than just design members – but in my opinion we’re years away from that. Most of the modeling software in popular use does not design and detail connections (in conjunction with global modeling). Likewise, today’s software does not find and resolve constructability problems. Those are the things I suspect most younger engineers are waiting for.

There are limitations with ALL structural engineering software. The challenge is for engineer to know and understand those limitations.

Having an understanding of constructability, connection design and detailing, and software limitations is extremely important for all engineers – and to my knowledge those things are not taught in college (with the exception that general graduate level courses in connection design are offered at most universities). Connection design is equal parts art and science. While the “science” part of connection design may be taught in school, the “art” part is learned on the job – hence the absolute necessity of having all designs performed by engineers (especially young ones) reviewed by experienced engineers.

 

[dik]

271828 alludes to it... checking shop drawings is an extremely important job, and often the last time to check for errors. A couple of issues. 1-1/2 years experience is a little light to catch some errors and being repetitive, it's easy to miss something. I design connections for metal fabricators and it can be monotonous. Once every several months, I come across and error on the EOR drawings; I revise the connection and ask for confirmation by the EOR.

The latest one, a few months ago, was the moment connection of a beam to an HSS column for a moment in excess of the column capacity. I don't raise any flags... just ask for confirmation (for liability reasons).

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

-Dik

 

[Enhineyero]

I agree with the comments above,

However, like you, I hated reviewing shop drawings as a young engineer.

More than a decade in, I find it more enjoyable, the addition of a 3D model on the shopdrawing package helped alot.

Can't put enough emphasis how important the process is. Good example is the shopdrawings I reviewed a few days ago. Detailer changed the roof beam pitch due to presence of a box gutter. It seriously affected roof connections, purlin connections, bracings, etc. Our clearance was short by 50mm and it made all the difference for the construction of the box gutter (Architects and their box gutters, yeah?).

It gave the Architect and myself a chance to resolve this before it was fabricated. It would have been a nightmare to repair this on site.

 

[ThomasH]

We’ve been using “AI” software since about 1980. Any structural engineering modeling software that analyzes structural framing and designs member is AI software.

Just out of curiosity, What structural engineering software have you used that you consider to be "AI"? I have not seen any that I would label in that manner. Or perhaps I misunderstood your statement?

 

[teeman]

Designers do not always understand what they are designing. Drawings go to drafters, who do not always understand what they are drawing. Plans go to Contractors, who may or may not recognize a error. There is a current class of managers who think that schedule and budget are more important than quality. I still do an inordinate amount of plan review. The hardest part of the review process is recognizing what is missing. Very few processes are more efficient, than doing it correctly the first time.

 

[cliff234]

ThomasH - By my definition all structural engineering software is “Artificial Intelligence” software. For example, if software is saving an engineer’s time by designing a steel beam (something that could have been done manually by that engineer), then that software was using “AI” to design the beam. I suspect we’ve become so used our amazing software unburdening us from 80% of the design effort required in the pre-computer days that we want it to now take on the remaining 20% of the effort. Unfortunately, the remaining 20% is the “art” of structural engineering. It is not a binary task, and is not easy to translate into binary code.

How do you write computer code to address and solve the many unique constructability problems that can occur in building structures? It’s challenging enough “programing” (i.e., training) human engineers to find and solve constructability issues!

 

[ThomasH]

By my definition all structural engineering software is “Artificial Intelligence” software.

Okey, I understand, you have your own definition of "AI". That explains it . By that definition I think any software can be considered "AI" since software usually has the purpose of simplifying somebodys work.

But I will continue to use more common definitions of "AI". An early approach was the Turing test, I don't know any structural software that would pass that test.