My company is designing a house on a hill. I am the project manager for this project and so I laid out a general design locating retaining walls to terrace a steep hill and to reduce drainage towards the house. The drawings were sent to the grading civil engineer. I expected they might have some suggestions but since they said nothing I thought everything was fine.
I know a lot of engineers just crunch numbers but you would think they would suggest something or say something to coordinate the various requirement of the grading design with the preliminary layout I gave them.
At any rate, all drawings were submitted to the building department. Weeks later when we got the drawings back and the plan checker had a comment that said we dont have any retaining wall details.
We relayed the information to Grading Civil Engineers. The guys at grading civil engineering started reducing the retaining wall heights so that they would be considered planter walls in order to reduce the scope of work.
Grading then came back to me and said I was responsible to do the retaining wall details.
I have no problems doing the retaining wall details but what exactly is the point of having grading civil engineers if they dont know how to design retaining walls on a hill?
What was suspicious about this company is that their grading plans barely showed anything.
I'm just trying to understand where the level of responsibility is.
Non Sequitur
Sep 30, 16 6:08 pm
Hire better consultants and/or lay out the scope of their responsibility before agreeing on their fees.
Everyday Intern
Sep 30, 16 6:12 pm
What does your agreement with them say they are responsible for?
Rem007
Sep 30, 16 6:18 pm
I dont have an agreement with them. The Owners of the house signed the contract with them. I was responsible for the house. Because engineers dont know how to design, I created a terraced design on a hill so they could see the design intent. .
What do grading civil engineers do if they dont do retaining walls?
chigurh
Sep 30, 16 6:44 pm
read their contract - probably grading and drainage, I'm sure they have a big section on the stuff they don't do - including wall structural.
Everyday Intern
Sep 30, 16 6:58 pm
What does your agreement with the Owner say you are responsible for? What does their agreement with the Owner say they are responsible for?
accesskb
Sep 30, 16 8:52 pm
No fool is going to make extra work for them self without being asked or required to.
gruen
Sep 30, 16 9:18 pm
If it's not in their scope, then tell the owner they need to pay civil more or get a strux. This is not your scope. Let the owner fight it w civil if they want to.
geezertect
Oct 1, 16 2:26 pm
No fool is going to make extra work for them self without being asked or required to.
Unless that fool is an architect. But I'm being redundant.
If your scope of work clearly doesn't call for you to design the walls, then it's not your problem. You presumably showed wall locations to give the graders a direction to go. They should have let you know they were, in effect, changing your design in order to make the walls "landscape walls" and not structural walls. Have a conversation with your owners to go over the merits of your scheme versus theirs, and explain to them that a structural wall will require additional engineering and money both to design and to build. Frankly, if landscape walls will accomplish the same objective, then the owner should just go that route, which will undoubtedly be cheaper. Maybe the grading guys were smarter than you about the best solution.
ArchNyen
Oct 1, 16 9:02 pm
Thrump is
that damn wall
mtdew
Oct 3, 16 10:35 am
Agreed with Curtis. Sounds like it falls under structural engineer's scope.
Please do not attempt to design the retaining wall. Why take on this liability. You can't just copy the same detail from a different project with a similar height wall. Soil report, water erosion, the structure beyond the wall, all affects the design of the wall.
Non Sequitur
Oct 3, 16 11:18 am
Do you think Trump will follow through with all those reports and consultants for his wall?
3tk
Oct 4, 16 11:50 am
Structural scope and they are the best qualified for the task - under 4 feet tall in some jurisdictions a landscape architect can stamp them too (and maybe even architect?). You can sketch a wall using a previous design, just have them give you the dimensions: toe, heel, footing, wall thickness; and reinforcing and jointing.
Dangermouse
Oct 4, 16 5:01 pm
sent does not mean received. don't assume everything is fine because you hear nothing back
My company is designing a house on a hill. I am the project manager for this project and so I laid out a general design locating retaining walls to terrace a steep hill and to reduce drainage towards the house. The drawings were sent to the grading civil engineer. I expected they might have some suggestions but since they said nothing I thought everything was fine.
I know a lot of engineers just crunch numbers but you would think they would suggest something or say something to coordinate the various requirement of the grading design with the preliminary layout I gave them.
At any rate, all drawings were submitted to the building department. Weeks later when we got the drawings back and the plan checker had a comment that said we dont have any retaining wall details.
We relayed the information to Grading Civil Engineers. The guys at grading civil engineering started reducing the retaining wall heights so that they would be considered planter walls in order to reduce the scope of work.
Grading then came back to me and said I was responsible to do the retaining wall details.
I have no problems doing the retaining wall details but what exactly is the point of having grading civil engineers if they dont know how to design retaining walls on a hill?
What was suspicious about this company is that their grading plans barely showed anything.
I'm just trying to understand where the level of responsibility is.
Hire better consultants and/or lay out the scope of their responsibility before agreeing on their fees.
What does your agreement with them say they are responsible for?
I dont have an agreement with them. The Owners of the house signed the contract with them. I was responsible for the house. Because engineers dont know how to design, I created a terraced design on a hill so they could see the design intent. .
What do grading civil engineers do if they dont do retaining walls?
read their contract - probably grading and drainage, I'm sure they have a big section on the stuff they don't do - including wall structural.
What does your agreement with the Owner say you are responsible for? What does their agreement with the Owner say they are responsible for?
No fool is going to make extra work for them self without being asked or required to.
If it's not in their scope, then tell the owner they need to pay civil more or get a strux. This is not your scope. Let the owner fight it w civil if they want to.
No fool is going to make extra work for them self without being asked or required to.
Unless that fool is an architect. But I'm being redundant.
If your scope of work clearly doesn't call for you to design the walls, then it's not your problem. You presumably showed wall locations to give the graders a direction to go. They should have let you know they were, in effect, changing your design in order to make the walls "landscape walls" and not structural walls. Have a conversation with your owners to go over the merits of your scheme versus theirs, and explain to them that a structural wall will require additional engineering and money both to design and to build. Frankly, if landscape walls will accomplish the same objective, then the owner should just go that route, which will undoubtedly be cheaper. Maybe the grading guys were smarter than you about the best solution.
Thrump is
that damn wall
Agreed with Curtis. Sounds like it falls under structural engineer's scope.
Please do not attempt to design the retaining wall. Why take on this liability. You can't just copy the same detail from a different project with a similar height wall. Soil report, water erosion, the structure beyond the wall, all affects the design of the wall.
Do you think Trump will follow through with all those reports and consultants for his wall?
Structural scope and they are the best qualified for the task - under 4 feet tall in some jurisdictions a landscape architect can stamp them too (and maybe even architect?). You can sketch a wall using a previous design, just have them give you the dimensions: toe, heel, footing, wall thickness; and reinforcing and jointing.
sent does not mean received. don't assume everything is fine because you hear nothing back