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Shop drawings, submittals and RFIs · Lesson 1 of 4

Shop drawings, submittals and RFIs: principles and terminology

The paper trail between the contract documents and the shop floor: the five submittal types, action versus informational, what an RFI asks and does not ask, what AFS provides, and why a review stamp is not a design check.

You will be able to: Tell a shop drawing from product data, a sample, a certificate and design data, tell action from informational submittals, say what an RFI is and what it is not, and name each party's job and the limits of a review stamp.

15 min · 11 slides · 14 questions

All lessons in this module
Slide 1 of 11

The paper trail from contract to shop floor

One project specification says submittals let the engineer judge whether proposed materials, equipment and work methods are in general conformance to the design concept.

In the college specification, work proceeds only on a final mark of Reviewed or Reviewed as Noted.

The general conditions of your own contract, and Section 01 33 00 of your project manual, decide the exact rules.

The paper trail from contract to shop floorFlow chart. Contract documents lead to a submittal register, then a prepared submittal, the contractor check and stamp, and the reviewer action stamp. Reviewed or Reviewed as Noted means buy, make and ship; Revise and resubmit loops back to prepare. A side branch: when the documents are unclear, send an RFI.The paper trail from contractto shop floorContract documentsdrawings, Section 01 33 00,Division 07 sectionSubmittal registerwho approves what, and whenPrepare the submittalshop drawing, product data,sampleContractor checksand stamps itReviewer actsarchitect or engineerActionstampReviewed orReviewed as Noted:buy, make, shipif it compliesRevise andresubmit: do notproceedresubmitDocumentsunclear? Sendan RFICollege spec: work goes aheadonly on a Reviewed mark.

A flow chart. Contract documents lead to a submittal register, a prepared submittal, the contractor check and stamp, and the reviewer action stamp. Reviewed or Reviewed as Noted means buy, make and ship; Revise and resubmit loops back to prepare. A side branch sends an RFI when the documents are unclear.

The college specification allows only stamped Reviewed or Reviewed as Noted submittals to be used for construction; other contracts, such as federal ones, may let work start earlier at the contractor's own risk. The stamp names are from one college specification; other contracts use their own.

Sources

Glossary

Submittal
Information the contractor sends the design team or owner so they can check proposed materials and methods against the contract documents before they are bought or built.
Shop drawing
A drawing prepared for one project to show how part of the work is made and fits, drawn accurately to scale and not copied from the contract documents or standard data.
Product data
Standard printed information about a product, such as catalog cuts and instructions, marked to show which products and options apply to the project.
Action submittal
In one college project specification, a submittal that requires the architect's responsive action; an informational submittal does not.
RFI
A request for information (also called a request for interpretation): a written question from the contractor when the contract documents are unclear, incorrect or silent.
Deviation
Anything in a submittal that differs from the contract documents; project specifications require it to be pointed out rather than left for the reviewer to find.
Approving authority
The person or office the contract names to approve a given submittal; federal guide specifications mark the items the Government must approve.