Civil Engineering Project Management (4th Edition)
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further drawings the contractor needs are supplied to him in good time. These<br />
may include drawings from plant suppliers of the foundations required for<br />
their plant and so on. If the engineer does not supply such drawings in time,<br />
the construction could be delayed, causing the contractor to claim for delay to<br />
part or whole of the job and any extra cost arising, which will have to be met.<br />
If the design of the works (or part of them) has not been undertaken by the<br />
engineer for the construction but by some other firm, the engineer will have<br />
to ensure they produce any further drawings and information required in good<br />
time. The engineer then has less control over the situation, with a greater chance<br />
of delays and errors arising. Time must be allowed for the engineer’s checking<br />
and possible amendment of designs submitted by others. A prudent engineer<br />
will ensure that all such information is in his hands as soon as the construction<br />
contract has been let.<br />
The engineer may require the contractor to supply drawings and details for<br />
his temporary works, such as formwork, including design calculations for the<br />
same. These must be checked and consented to by the engineer to ensure they<br />
are suitable and not detrimental to the permanent works. Time must be allowed<br />
for this process including time for any possible amendments.<br />
Designs will also have to be checked against safety requirements of the<br />
Construction, Design and <strong>Management</strong> (CDM) Regulations (see Sections 10.2<br />
and 10.3).<br />
On some large jobs or those overseas, there has been a practice to divorce<br />
construction from design. The employer uses one firm to produce design drawings<br />
and specifications, on receipt of which the employer pays the designer off.<br />
The employer then uses the drawings and specifications to get tenders for construction,<br />
and engages another firm to supervise the work of the construction<br />
contractor. This approach can be very unsatisfactory because, if constructional<br />
difficulties are encountered or variations prove necessary, the measures taken<br />
may not be in line with design assumptions made by the designer. The firm<br />
supervising construction will have no rights to contact the designer, and the<br />
designer has no obligation to provide any further information.<br />
For some types of structures, such as dams or earthworks, where the safety<br />
and durability of the structure is highly dependent upon the nature of the<br />
foundations and materials used in the construction, a responsible engineer or<br />
firm of consultants would not be prepared to undertake the design without<br />
also having rights to supervise construction.<br />
8.6 Quality assurance considerations<br />
The employer and his engineer 93<br />
A contractor may run a quality assurance (QA) system and some employers<br />
take this into consideration when making a list of selected contractors for<br />
tendering. QA is an administrative system for checking that the quality of a<br />
firm’s output complies with some set standards (see Reference 1). But this does<br />
not include a definition of the standards. For example a contractor may issue