As-Builts: A Peek at the Real Thing

If you've been following the As-Built series in this blog, you're probably expecting to see how all our measuring, jotting and sketching rolled into a final document. I promise the final as-built is coming soon but I came across this and thought this would be a good time to show you a real take-off.

This sketch is my friend's house.  I designed an addition for her birthday, and of course, an as-built was necessary to begin the design.  There are a few things to point out here:

1. This sketch is a mess. If you look closely you will notice some similarities, but it's cluttered and hard to read.  This is what a fact-finding document looks like in the real world.  The examples in this blog are from my book, which I carefully developed as a visual tool.  So go ahead and be messy like this.

2.  When I'm measuring for as-built drawings I want to just get it over; it shouldn't take more than an hour.  You'll notice that some of my dimensions are in inches and some are in feet. I like to jot down measurements in inches when I'm measuring in the field.  I don't spend a lot of time looking the tape measure up and down, I just look at the inches and bam, I'm onto the next measurement. Then I can convert my measurements in feet/inches with a steaming cup of coffee, where I'm less likely to make a conversion mistake.

3.  This was the extent of my notes.  I didn't need to go back to her house to get any additional information.

So there you go!  I'd love to see your plan sketches. Leave me a comment and we'll post yours too.