Structural Steel Detailing Services for Fabricators and Erectors
Structural steel detailing services in Tekla Structures and SDS2: erection drawings, assembly and single part sheets, anchor rod setting plans, the advance bill of material and NC files for your beam line. Awarded the steel, whether you are the fabricator, the steel subcontractor or the general contractor? Our detailers work as an extension of your team, from the anchor rod setting plan to the last released sequence.
What a released sequence ships with
- Erection drawings with the piece marks in your numbering
- Assembly and single part sheets drawn for your shop floor
- Anchor rod setting plan with template and grid dimensions
- Advance bill of material your buyer can send to a mill
- DSTV NC1, DXF nests and a KISS export for your EPM system
What a package of steel shop drawings actually contains
Steel shop drawings come in two families of sheets for two audiences who never open the same page. The erector works off marks and plans, the shop works off dimensions and holes.
Erection drawings, the sheets the erector reads
Also called general arrangement, or GA.
Plans, elevations, marks and shipping lots
GAEvery piece located and marked, with column lines, top of steel elevations, working points and the field connections called out at each joint. Piece marks follow your numbering scheme, in your prefix convention. The erection sequence drives the detailing sequence and the shipping lots, never the reverse.
Steel fabrication drawings, the sheets the shop reads
Assembly drawings
MAINOne fabricated member per sheet with every attached part located from a work point: clips, stiffeners, gussets, plates, holes, welds.
Single part drawings
PARTSOne cut piece per sheet, with every hole, bevel, cope and radius, ready for the burn table or the drill line. A single part drawing and the NC1 file for that part come out of the same model, and both are checked against the assembly.
Connection details and weld symbols
JOINTSShear tabs, angles, end plates, seated and moment connections, braced frame gussets, HSS joints and base plates, drawn with AWS A2.4 symbols against AWS D1.1 requirements.
Steel joist and metal deck detailing, and where the package stops
Joists and metal deck
SJI / SDIJoists are designed and detailed by the joist manufacturer to SJI standards. What this desk owns is the interface: bearing seats, bridging anchorage and the top of steel that has to reconcile between two submittals. Deck is laid out and supplied against SDI conventions, and the detailing question is the support at edges and openings.
What is not in a steel package
BOUNDARYMeasured quantities for a bid are a different product on a different desk, and detailing rates are a bad way to buy them.
Anchor rod setting plans, the anchor bolt plan that ships first
AISC says anchor rod and the shop still says anchor bolt. Either way it is the first drawing off this desk, it goes out weeks ahead of the steel, and it is the only sheet whose mistake gets buried in concrete.
A setting plan is drawn for a concrete crew, not for an ironworker. It carries the rod layout under every base plate, the projection above top of concrete, the embedment the engineer specified, the template dimensions and the column line each group is dimensioned from.
Two conflicts turn up on almost every job and neither is drawn on the structural sheets. The rod group fights the pier reinforcing, and the leveling nut and grout space fight the finished floor elevation. Both are cheap questions before the pour and expensive ones after it.
Whose standards the drawings follow, captured before anything is modeled
Steel detailing for fabricators goes wrong on the first two jobs for one reason: the detailer detailed to their own habits. This is the intake sheet.
Send one sequence before you send a job
One sequence, one stair, one misc metals package, priced in writing first. The drawings, the production files and the model on request come over whether or not there is a second one.
Where connection design stops and detailing starts
Connection design coordination and connection design are two different jobs, and a detailer who blurs them costs you a rejected submittal.
Who designs the connections on your job?
The contract documents decide: the engineer of record shows the connections complete, gives forces for the fabricator's licensed engineer to complete them, or sets criteria for that engineer to design to. Settle which applies before modeling starts.
Do you seal or stamp connection design?
No. This desk does not employ a licensed professional engineer, does not seal connection design and is not the engineer of record. Delegated connection design has to be sealed by an engineer licensed in the project state. Here the engineer's forces and details get modeled, checked, and questioned where they do not close. Sealed stair and rail design, erection engineering, lift plans and special inspection need a licensed engineer, not this desk. An approved shop drawing does not move responsibility for a dimension or a hole location to the engineer.
What happens when the drawings give no connection forces?
It becomes the first RFI, with a schedule attached rather than a paragraph. Missing forces are a common hole in a structural set, so affected members are listed with blank force columns and the engineer fills in one table instead of answering separate questions.
When should you keep the detailing in house?
Whenever your board has float. If all you need is the mill order away, buy the advance bill of material alone and draw the rest yourself. A model abandoned at sixty percent costs more inherited than restarted, and we say so before quoting.
The AISC 303 submittal clock, and the return statuses
The submittal clock is the part of a steel schedule nobody controls and everybody blames, so here is what each return status costs you.
| Approved | Your reading of the contract documents is accepted | Nothing. Release the sequence and cut steel |
|---|---|---|
| Approved as Noted | Accepted, with corrections to work in before release | Hours. Notes get modeled in, no resubmittal |
| Revise and Resubmit | Rejected in part, and back through the full review | A second review window on top of the redraw |
| Rejected | The submittal does not represent the design intent | The sequence restarts, usually behind an RFI |
| Returned late, or not at all | The window in the specification has quietly passed | Your detailing float, while the mill date holds |
The checker is a different person, and here is the list
The detailer who modeled the sequence checks it, then a second detailer who never touched it back-checks the package on a check print against this list.
Ask before you send a drawing set
Which seats we run, who checks the package, whether your controller is covered. Ask for the free NC file test along with the question.
CNC and EPM output, DSTV NC1, DXF nests and KISS
The file format is not the deliverable. A DSTV file your beam line will not read, or reads with the holes a millimeter out, stops the machine exactly as hard as no file at all.
Tekla steel detailing services, and what leaves with you
The Tekla model
DB1The .db1 model comes over on request. Tekla opens forward only, so a seat one release behind cannot open a newer model, and the release your seat runs is agreed at the quote rather than discovered at handover. IFC loses connection intelligence, so it is right for coordination with the architect and wrong as your record model.
SDS2, and what we do not run
SDS2SDS2 runs here as well, and the choice follows your shop rather than our preference. There is no Advance Steel seat here: if your existing model is authored in it, say so at quote stage and you get a straight answer about whether the job is a fit.
Production files for the machines on your floor
DSTV NC1 for the beam and drill line
NC1The .nc1 files come out mapped to the machine you name. Peddinghaus, Voortman and Ficep controllers do not all take an identical file, so tell us the machine and the controller, not just the brand.
DXF nests for the plate table
DXFPlate parts come out as DXF for the burn table, unfolded where the part is bent, with the bend allowance stated rather than assumed.
KISS into your EPM system
KISSA KISS export drops the bill of material straight into Tekla EPM, StruMIS or FabTrol so nobody retypes a mark list.
Prove the output before you commit to anything
The NC file test, at no cost
FREESend one part you have already run, the single part drawing or the .nc1 your own line was fed, and name the machine and the controller on it. A matched DSTV NC1 comes back free. Load it, or diff it against the file you already hold, and you know inside an hour whether this output drives your line. No quote, no obligation, no sales call attached to it.
Miscellaneous metals detailing, stairs, rails and the orphaned pieces
Miscellaneous metals is where steel packages leak. Embeds, lintels, kickers and stair headers sit between two subcontracts.
Miscellaneous metals shop drawings, and the pieces that get orphaned
Where the seam sits and which pieces go missing
05 12 / 05 50Structural steel framing is 05 12 00, joists 05 21 00, decking 05 31 00, and metal fabrications start at 05 50 00. The same pieces go missing on job after job: embeds, loose lintels, wall kickers, stair headers and railing post baseplates.
Steel stair and railing shop drawings
Stairs
05 51 00Stringers, treads, risers, landing framing, hangers and the connections back into the frame, plus the field dimensions that have to be verified before anything is cut. Geometry that does not comply with the governing code goes back as an RFI with the arithmetic attached and two options priced.
Railings and guards
05 52 00Posts, top rails, infill, wall returns and the anchorage. The anchorage is where it goes wrong: a guard bolted to a slab edge with no embed and no reinforcement behind it.
Gratings, floor plate and access
05 53 00Bar grating, checker plate, hatches, ladders, cages and platform framing, detailed for support spacing against a deflection limit.
AESS categories and galvanizing, what each does to the drawings
Two specification notes change the model rather than the paint shop: an AESS (architecturally exposed structural steel) category, and a hot dip galvanizing requirement.
AESS detailing is a modeling decision, not a finishing one
The AESS category has to be identified in the model before fabrication, not discovered at paint. At the higher categories tolerances tighten, welds get ground and filled, and a mock up can be required before production runs, which belongs in the quote before the job is booked.
Vent and drain holes that were never on the design drawings
A hot dip galvanized member needs zinc to get in and air to get out, so vent and drain holes get located and sized by the detailer, on the drawing, following ASTM A385 practice, and sealed assemblies are identified before they burst in the kettle. A slip critical joint on a galvanized member needs its faying surface condition stated on the drawing, to the edition of the RCSC specification the contract cites.
Where shop primer stops and field work starts
Faying surfaces, members due for sprayed fireproofing, embedded surfaces and the top flange under composite deck all get masked or left bare, and every one of those boundaries is a drawing instruction.
The detailing calendar, mapped onto mill and fabrication dates
This is a calendar, not a claim about speed. Put your own mill lead time and your own erection start against it.
Shop standards signed, erection sequence agreed
Advance bill of material to your buyer
Steel detailing turnaround time is a sequence release date
Approval review, and a resubmittal if it comes
Release for fabrication, NC output, shop floor
Steel detailing services for erectors, after release
Capacity for a full award, not one sequence
A whole award is a run of sequences released against one calendar, not one order. On a monthly partnership your sequences hold priority in that calendar and the standards sheet is agreed once, not per job.
RFI response in US hours, and the revision split by cause
Two things decide whether an outside detailer costs or saves: how fast a question gets answered, and who pays when a drawing turns out wrong.
When will somebody actually answer an RFI?
In US business hours, by a named detailer on your job, not a ticket queue and not a shared inbox. Messages get a reply within 30 minutes during the working day. Chasing the engineer's answer is our work too.
What does a well formed RFI from a detailer look like?
One question, one subject: the sheet and detail it comes from, the members affected, what was assumed in the meantime, and the schedule consequence of a late answer. An engineer can answer that quickly.
If the drawing turns out wrong, who pays to fix it?
Split by cause, in writing, before the job starts. Our error is corrected at no charge and on the fastest clock available, corrected sheets and files included. A design change, an owner scope change or a sequence change after release is priced and quoted before any work starts, never added to an invoice afterwards.
How are revisions tracked, and who sees your files?
R0, R1 and R2 on the sheet, clouds and revision triangles around what moved, and the superseded issue kept rather than overwritten. An NDA is signed on request before a file changes hands. Your files are used for your work, and nothing from your job is shown to another fabricator or used as a sample without your written permission.
How steel detailing services are priced, and what a paid pilot covers
Fabricators outsource steel detailing services when the award and the queue collide, and they buy the work on five bases that each reward and punish a different kind of job.
| Per ton | Heavy repetitive frames with simple shear tabs | Light frames, connection heavy work, misc metals |
|---|---|---|
| Per sheet | Simple sheets, and a lot of them | Dense sheets, and anybody who details efficiently |
| Per hour | The detailer, on every job, always | The buyer, who cannot budget before the invoice |
| Per piece | Long simple members with little attached | Stairs, rails and anything with parts on it |
| Fixed quote per sequence | The buyer, who has the number before work starts | Us, on the job where the set was read too fast |
Structural steel detailing services, your questions answered straight
What fabricators, erectors, steel subcontractors and general contractors ask before they hand a structural set to an outside detailer.
The basics
The ABM and the mill
Scope and responsibility
Buying it
Send the structural set and get a
sequence calendar
Name the fabricator, the erection sequence and the machines on your floor. A fixed price, a first submittal date and a release interval come back in writing before a single piece is modeled.