RE: ASME B31 Appendix Z

<<<Exactly. Drawings must communicate the intent of the designer to the tradesman. Or in the case of questions, such as those presented to ASME B31 Code Committee, clearly explain the question. Drawings that fail to do so are of little value and reflect either a lack of experience on the part of the draftsman (and the checker), or a lack of caring, or both.>>>

Being a newbie (less than two years into the field) I have found this has been the toughest part to get used to.

Seeing as I had never been anywhere NEAR the construction aspect in jobs' past, I had never known what exactly contractors do to get things built, no clue as to their procedures, the stuff they'll do on the fly, the stuff they need to know to complete the job at hand, etc.

NOW, my job is to make drawings so that these guys can build off of. So on top of learning the engineering aspect, I'm also trying to pick up "tricks of the trade" from contractors, learning fundamental of civil work (for supports, both the supports themselves and what I can support off of)..

The best advice I ever heard was when I guy asked me one day, "If you had all the parts and equipment in your back yard, could YOU put this together with what's on this drawing?" Then he added "Remember, YOU know what you meant when you drew it, some guy in a far away land only has what you told him on this drawing to go by."

Michael Roble

Piping Department

Continental Design & Management Group

Pittsburgh, PA

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed] Received on Thu Sep 27 15:20:00 2007