Here is the section I like to include concerning documents and design. It's written for use in the south. Feel free to adjust it for your specific location. I must say that living by these rules has provided countless numbers of satisfying projects.
Bidding - Additional Requirements Section 1A - The requirements of Division 01 and of those documents under bidding requirements and conditions of the contract and anything else we don't think looks good here is null and void. If you know what's good for you, you'd read this real close (meaning the contractor). 1.1 The work we did is clearly showed in the attached plans and specifications. Our engineer, whose had plenty of college, spent one h*ll of a lot of time when he drawed up these here plans and specifications, but nobody can think of everything. Once your bid is in - that's it, brother. From then on, anything wanted by our engineer, or any of his friends, or anybody else (except the contractor) shall be considered as showed, specified or implied and shall be provided by the contractor without no expense to nobody, but himself (meaning the contractor). 1.2 If the work is did without no expense to the contractor, then the work will be took down and did again until the extra expense to the contractor is satisfactory to our engineer. 1.3 Our engineer's plans is right as drawed. If sumthin is drawed wrong, it shall be discovered by the contractor, corrected, and did right at no extra expense to us. It won't cut no ice with us or our engineer if you point out any mistakes our engineer has drawed. If you do, it will be one h*ll of a long time before you do any more work for us or him (meaning the engineer). 1.4 The contractor is not supposed to make fun of our engineer, his plans, or the kind of work we're having did. If he does, it's just too bad for him (meaning the contractor). 1.5 Any contractor walking around the jobs with a smile on his face is subject to the review of his bid. 1.6 If the contractor don't find all our engineer's mistakes before he bids the job, or if the contractor ain't got enough sense to know that our engineer is going to think up a bunch of new stuff that's going to have to be did before the job is complete, then it's just too bad for him (meaning the contractor). END OF SECTION Craig L. Prahl, CET Fire Protection Specialist Mechanical Department CH2MHILL Lockwood Greene 1500 International Drive PO Box 491, Spartanburg, SC 29304-0491 Direct - 864.599.4102 Fax - 864.599.8439 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ch2m.com -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jim Davidson Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 1:24 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Spec's. vs. Drawings Russell, The reason that some are saying consult your attorney is that depending on the type of project, the trade contractor has a set of expectations for the bid documents and your attorney can better define your right for recovery of costs. Depending on whether the project is a "private" or "public"; if "private" then the contract documents should spell out what takes preference, drawings, documents or code. First and foremost, the design of the automatic fire sprinkler system is the responsibility of the design professional under most state engineering laws and according to the SFPE "White Paper" a trade contractor and/or design technician can only prepare fire protection shop drawings in conformance with engineering design documents (bid documents from the Owner) or in strict compliance with the NFPA standards. If a "public" project then the Owner's design professional needed to provide to the contractor, documents that are complete, clear and accurately defines the scope of work as established in U.S. Supreme Court, U. S. v. Spearin, 248 U.S. 132 (1918). The court found that a contractor has a right to expect the Owner to provide construction documents that are complete, correct and accurate. Federal case law supports the premise that contractors are not responsible for defects in plans and specifications, and a contractor's duty to check plans does not impose an obligation on the contractor to ensure the design will meet its purpose. There are various facets of the law that varies by legal jurisdictions and your attorney can best define the rights that the contractor hasto recover cost and delays. Have a fire safe day! Jim Davidson Davidson Associates 302-994-9500 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Russell Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 11:01 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Spec's. vs. Drawings We generally approach projects with humility just to be sure we don't get on the wrong side of the AHJ whom we will most likely be working with in the future, including the general contractors. We have had some of the contract documents state the items that have precedence but that is most often not the situation. Probably 90% or more documents have spec's. that are generic and just pulled off a shelf and stuck into the project and are loaded with lots of things that are not even closely related to the project at hand. We will RFI some things sometimes considering the impact but in this case I did not feel an RFI was needed but after the system was completed is when the architect wanted to go by the spec's. and not the drawings. It's not a big deal to make the alterations so we are going to roll over just to keep good relations but this instance did bring up the question of is it on paper or just understood when there is nothing noted in the spec's. or on the drawings stating the precedence without RFI'ing every item which may not agree with each other which in some cases be quite a lot. Doing that, I have found, can make me come across to the G.C. and engineer as being very picky which gives them the feeling that we are going to be hard to get along with. This I work hard to make sure doesn't happen unless there's a lot of money involved! Thanks all for the input. Russell Rewis Brown Automatic Sprinklers, Inc. 107C Hemlock Street Valdosta, Georgia 31601 229-244-8130 [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field)
