Page 181 - Civil Engineering Project Management, Fourth Edition

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The resident engineer’s office records
in red on a copy of the contract drawings, the original master copies of the con-
tract drawings then being amended. This is not entirely satisfactory because not
all contract drawings are relevant or sufficient for record purposes. To make a
good set of record drawings may involve discarding a number of contract draw-
ings; and using ‘cut-and-paste’ methods to make up a single drawing from
parts of contract drawings, or producing completely new drawings. Foundation
drawings which have been prepared on site to show the contractor precise
dimensions and levels for foundation excavations should be included among
the record drawings.
A drawing showing important details of construction can often be made up
from copies of sketches supplied to the contractor. Such details can be invalu-
able in tracking down the possible cause of some after-trouble, such as damp
penetration.
In general record drawings should give:
• a good detailed layout plan of the project;
• a detailed foundation plan;
• floor plans for inside of buildings;
• plans showing the location of everything underground and what depth it is;
• details of construction where these are hidden from view.
Where new drawings produced on site are ultimately required in a digital
format, this may have to be carried out at the engineer’s head office.
It is not necessary to show all the minutiae of construction which can be
seen or measured on site after construction is completed. Copies of reinforce-
ment drawings are usually supplied separately bound from the record draw-
ings. Their main purpose is to show what size and spacing of reinforcement
was used. They cannot show the exact position of bars.
On clearing up the site supervision organization, all drawings superseded
and not applicable to the finished works should be destroyed. This is import-
ant, because if any drawing remains of some proposal not adopted, confu-
sion may later be raised as to how a structure was actually built. This can give
rise to serious difficulties when, for instance, later repairs have to be under-
taken on a dam, or tunnelling below a structure has to be undertaken. The
position of all services underground should also be marked to avoid trouble
when additional services have to be laid later.

13.16 Other records

A job completion report may be of significant value, both for publicity pur-
poses and for logging down experiences that can be of value later. The salient
facts about the project should be listed – client; description of works; purpose,
sizes and outputs; designers and contractors involved; dates started and
finished; budgeted cost, final cost and chief reasons for any difference; date
of opening ceremony, etc. A short report should be attached of any significant