Back when we still used paper prints, I saw a crew cut a beam short because they read the wrong revision.

I mean, that was maybe eight years ago on a school job in Tacoma. The foreman had the updated digital plan on his tablet but the guys on the saw had the old paper set. They wasted a full day's work and a bunch of material. Now, with everyone on the same cloud plan, that just shouldn't happen, but I still see teams not locking down which file version is the official one. How do you guys handle revision control to stop that kind of waste?

3 comments

3 Comments

wilson.olivia1d ago

I used to think paper was safer. Not anymore.

wood.uma1d ago

You know what's wild? I read a case study about a hospital expansion where they had the same problem, but with plumbing. The digital master file said one thing, but the printed sheets at the bend shop were two revisions back. They installed like 40 feet of the wrong diameter pipe before anyone caught it. Isn't the whole point of the cloud to have one source of truth? Seems like the rule now has to be "if it's not in the folder marked 'Current for Construction', don't even look at it.

mileslane1d ago

Yeah, and I'm the guy who once ordered the wrong windows because I was looking at a PDF saved to my desktop from like three months prior. Felt real smart when they showed up on site. So now I'm a total fanatic about the file name thing. We add the date and revision letter right into the filename, and if you print it, you have to write that same info on the sheet with a big red pen. It's low tech, but it makes you stop and think.