×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?
6

Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

(OP)
Do some companies just not bother with buying standards not often used? ASME standards are at visible places, but EN and API standards are nowhere to be seen. Is it just the companies I have been, or it's the same with many companies?

It's quite annoying not be able to find what I need. It's like this in my last company, people suggested to have them electronically stored on the intranet, make it easier for people to search and find what they want, not sure if any company does it, it seems very costly.

Anyway, I have got a new job, and my old ID got blocked... don't know why.
 

Cutie

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

3
You've hit on a sore point with me for sure.  Lack of availability is the key reason these standards are often ignored or improperly followed, sometimes putting life and limb at risk.

Any standard which becomes a de-facto regulation under a piece of legislation, SHOULD be available free of charge- or they should be replaced with standards which ARE freely available.  The TSSA Act in Ontario, for instance, gives CSA B51 and hence ASME VIII and the various B31 piping codes essentially the force of regulation.  

In fact, some standards such as the Ontario Building Code ARE indeed available free of charge on Canadian legal websites- but you have to look damned hard to FIND them.

Yeah, I know that the organizations which produce and maintain these standards require a means of funding.  I'm just saying that this funding should no longer be provided on a "user-pay" basis.  Rather, they should be funded by government.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Because the standards are copyright-protected material.  You have to buy them.  The owners protect their copyright and do not allow the standards to be tossed up on the web for all to use for free.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Simply put, companies (engineering companies in particular) do not view the acquisition and updating of standards as a necessary cost of doing business.  they will, however, spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in intranet systems, email migrations and accounting software...

Not that I am in any way bitter...

Regards,

SNORGY.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Some companies watch the pennies so close they will only approve buying one standard at a time and probably reject a few requests on principle.
Don't I know it.
I have a couple of standards I have bought out of my onw pocket.
But the standards can be bought en mass which makes a much better deal for a company and makes it much easier for all concerned. The only thing needed is to ensure they are properly controlled within the organisation.
 

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I was looking for some basic standards and references in my new position.  Everyone I asked said they haven't seen them.  I finally talked to someone "in the know", and his response was that they were never used, so they were boxed-up and placed in corporate storage.  Yikes!

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies to make the best use of these Forums?

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

This goes back to my complaint in another thread.
When engineering managers are not engineers, they don't give a damn about standards. To them the standards are unnecessary costs, extra work, and paperwork.
They don't understand the world of design.

Chris
SolidWorks 09 SP4.1
ctopher's home
SolidWorks Legion

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

(OP)
I totally agree with you Chris, I'm trying to purchase relief valves, but we haven't got the relevant API standards I could check. I have just spent all day looking on Google hoping I could get lucky to get a free copy somewhere... and I very much doubt we will ever buy these standards...I'm new here, I wonder how they managed without the standards in the past years ...  

Cutie

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I am one of the Lucky ones I guess, If I need a standard I just fill out the requisition and my boss immediatly approves it. No questions asked. Its great but I can see it coming to an end as the company grows, only time will tell.

JMW your comment regarding the proper control of standards is on the money. I am attempting to get that fixed here. Time will tell if I am successfull. So far document control has been very resistant to change (i.e. WORK).

Always remember, free advice is worth exactly what you pay for it!   

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Wow, I actually have something to add.

I completely agree with the other posters, $400 for a standard is "outrageous" but show me one accounting or IT product under $2,500.

And last I checked neither is something our clients pay us for, but I digress.

Be careful placing PDF copies of certain standards (like API) on a company server, my experience has been that once you do that, the only computer that could then open it was the server, ......this was sort of a problem.

I am guessing there is a way to make it work on a server, but I just thought I would mention it so you don't have to buy it twice.

this message has been approved for citizen to elect kepharda 2008

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I am not an expert in this area but I certainly have seen (and fought with) some of the issues raised here.  At most of the aerospace engineering organzations where I have worked, we are normally in the retrofit regime.

I have only ever worked for one OEM (Rockwell Collins, on a one year contract).  At Rockwell Collins having access to standards ON REVISION SERVICE was not even questioned...it was considered a mandatory requirement and not negotiable.

At most of all the other organizations where I did engineering, either contract or direct, the general thought pattern was that the standards are good to have but no one wants to fight the capital budget folks for funds to keep them ON REVISION SERVICE.

I capitalized ON REVISION SERVICE because in my humble (ok not really so humble) opinion, and standards that are genuinely necessary for the task must be on revision service or there is always the risk of liability if the worst happens.

I can only imagine what a sharp lawyer would do with the information that a design was created to a standard but there was no process in place to verify it was the current standard.

I completely agree that most standards that change do not usually change the core focus, and that designs built to the old standard will not suddenly start falling out of the sky because the standard was revised.  But I would really prefer an effort by management to state, "These are the standards (and list the standards in writing) without which we cannot comply with FAA requirements, and thus we will bite the bullet to have these on revision service no matter how many bean counters disagree."

I realize managers always have to consider cost, but risk should be in that calculation too.  Maybe it is and I just don't recognize it.

  

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

kepharda,
I'm not sure about the copy write aspects of publishing them on the intranet.

Sure, the quick way to get them is to purchase and download over the internet as pdf files, but I'd suspect that there may be some dangers of putting them on the company server where anyone can access, print copy and distribute in emails etc.

In my last company the drawing office maintained full control which included only letting out paper copies and having a register of who had them.

Of course, some guys would sign out a standard and never return it so you had to track them down and pester them to find what they had done with it and some guys tended to think of them as their own personal property so it got a bit fraught trying to separate them from a standard they had "acquired" some years earlier but not used since.

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

A company that say they work to a standard had better be able to show they have or have access to that standard. If they do not, I would think (i.e. if it was me making the decision), that their statement would not be given any weight. In any case it would take some proving (and cost much more than the standard), to show they knew the standard.

Peter Stockhausen
Senior Design Analyst (Checker)
Infotech Aerospace Services
www.infotechpr.net

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I have seen PDF standards for network use, usually you have to pay for a network license that covers 3 or 5 "seats" of the standard.  When they are printed, they are watermarked to prevent free-copying and distribution.

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies to make the best use of these Forums?

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Our client company has access to a service that provides such standards. I recently read part of the new ASME Y14.5 2009 there. Check into the cost. You would have access to most of the standards there are. (I will try to remember to post the name of the service, it is quiting time.)

Peter Stockhausen
Senior Design Analyst (Checker)
Infotech Aerospace Services
www.infotechpr.net

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Everywhere I have worked in the past had some sort of service to provide current and pertinent standards, until now.  I share your frustration.
CONGRATS ON THE JOB!!!cheers

"Good to know you got shoes to wear when you find the floor." - Robert Hunter
 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I'm lucky.  Through a service offered by another company, my company subscribes to a collection of standards.  The collection one can access is based on that person's location.  I can access many standards, including those from API, ASME, AWS, and ISO.  I'm not sure exactly how it works because sometimes the current version is unavailable (I can download past versions though), but most of what I need is available.  If it's not I just buy it and expense it - I don't bother asking the boss unless it's more than $100.   

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I have no idea of the cost, but we have all the Australian Standards online. The company maintains 6 licences a year, meaning 6 people can be online at the same time.

Any standard I want is right at my finger tips. The ones I use more frequently I have printed out and bound.

We have hard copies of a few API and ASME standards, it is a hassle when they update them though....

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

When I worked at my first company we had full access to just about every spec and standard known to man. the service name was IHS, and it was as close to engineering heaven as I am likley to get.

Somedays I miss it dearly. Looked into a subsricption once I became a contracter but it was not economical for less then about 20 seats, so here I sit forced to buy them when I need them.

 

Always remember, free advice is worth exactly what you pay for it!   

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

(OP)
If you already have a copy of the standards, do you still need to pay the full cost for a revised one? Why do they revise the standards so often?

Thanks ewh :)

I doubt I will ever use my own money to buy the standards.
 

Cutie

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I work to ANSI/ISO 9899-1990.  It cost me £28.95 back in 1994.

- Steve

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

IHS is the company that our client uses (and we have access to). Thanks ColonelSanders, I don't have to look.

Peter Stockhausen
Senior Design Analyst (Checker)
Infotech Aerospace Services
www.infotechpr.net

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

@ ColonelSanders83

We too are lucky enough to subscribe to this service (IHS). The fact that my company is multi-disciplinary, doing highways, water, building services and environmental engineering on a national and international basis, means that this service virtually pays for itself.

In addition, with respect to highways, the UK Highways Agency provides a website;
http://www.standardsforhighways.co.uk/
wherein all the latest standards pertaining to bridge and highway design for our trunk road/motorway network are available (DMRB), together with the relevant Specification and BoQ documents (MCHW).

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Just before I moved to the States my UK company got subscription to the BS website what allowed us to look up almost any BS standard (except the old ones that hadn't been scanned yet).  DEF-STANS were already like that, or maybe it was on our intranet, either way you could look them up.

We had a small internal library (downsized in the mid 90's before I started there) which had a lot of the most commonly used one with the update service.  We also had some set up with the library that we could order (to loan) standards we wanted to look at.

My current place in the US is week.  For a while there was some impetus on drawing standards and we bought quite a few but this is dwindling, to the point I didn't have ASME Y14.5M for a while (as the owner  of the copy I used got laid off) until a copy 'appeared' that in intern had and I nabbed it.

Posting guidelines FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm? (probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: FAQ1088-1484: In layman terms, what is "engineering"?

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

We have IHS too and, as the Colonel said, it's total heaven.  Man, I need to get a life.

Anyway, engineers citing ASTMs and other standards without reviewing them are playing a dangerous game.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

As an afterthought, I recently came accross this site and have found it quite usfull. It's not IHS, but it you need free open access specs it a great place to look.

http://www.everyspec.com/

"EverySpec.com provides free access to over 20,000 Military, DoD, Federal, NASA, DOE, and Government specifications, standards, handbooks, and publications."

The specs are all developed with public money's so they are available to the public. Alot of them have some damn good design info if you know what to look for. They really do cover everything under the sun, from toilet seats, to hammers, to the parts of 2.5 billion dollar submarines that arn't classified.

Some examples

http://www.everyspec.com/MIL-STD/MIL-STD+(0000+-+0099)/MIL-STD-22D_5107/

http://www.everyspec.com/USN/NAVSEA/S9505-AM-GYD-010Rev-2_5630/

http://www.everyspec.com/NASA/NASA+-+MSFC/MSFC-STD/MSFC-STD-486B-_Torque_Limits_For_Standard_Threaded_Fasteners_2503/

Enjoy!

Always remember, free advice is worth exactly what you pay for it!   

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

kepharda:  if your company has to buy 10 accounting packages every two years, they're in deep trouble.  I fail to see how your comparison is valid.

In an office with only a couple of engineers, keeping abreast of standards is a significant overhead cost.  Not up there with liability insurance, but nothing to sneeze at either.

In shops which DON'T do engineering but DO purport to fabricate in accordance with these standards, it can be a very significant overhead cost- so significant that they very often do not keep current.

In universities, where the proper use of these standards SHOULD be taught, unless you bootleg them or get some kind of university exemption for their reproduction for educational purposes, the cost is beyond practical.

If the standards are to have force of law, they must be freely available.  Otherwise, people who b*tch about them not being followed are just blowing hot air.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

First of all: Stop bitching that standards cost money - you dont work for free either! And the cost is of course not just the cost of printing - but some of these standard only sell in limited numbers and have high cost during development!

Second: Looking for a one-stop-shop? Go to:

http://www.global.ihs.com/

Here you will find almost any standard from anywhere on the globe! (no - not "free", not illigal copies etc.)

This: Engcutie: You seem to be looking for API520 - well if you dont need the exact copy then you will find all of the sizing info in the Crossby engineering handbook - FREE!

http://www.tycovalves-na.com/ld/CROMC-0296-US.pdf

Best regards

Morten

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

MortenA:  I'm not bitching about paying for them.  I'm bitching about the current system, where only the honest people pay for them.  The rest steal them, or ignore them.

Since the public are being protected by the application of these standards, the public should pay for their development and they should be freely available.  Public goods should be paid for from the public purse.  This so-called "user pay" model we have now is a recipie for non-compliance.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Well I know for a fact that some people steal in grocery shops too!

So there you have it, next time you are in the supermarket feel free to fill your pockets!

Best regards

Morten

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

The people that purchase and use standards are not generally the type of people that steal at grocery stores, or anywhere else.
A whole different subject.
ASME has done a pretty good job to keep their docs out of the wrong hands, like torrent sites.
Companies that do engineering mechanical design should invest in a set of drafting/design/material standards. The cost may be high on some, but the savings will be higher because of better quality parts (if employees trained and use them correctly).

Chris
SolidWorks 09 SP4.1
ctopher's home
SolidWorks Legion

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

One could point out that the people who actually do the work on writing the standards usually don't get paid...

Hg

Eng-Tips policies:  FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

This could also be compared to software pirating.  A few years ago there was a lot publicity about companies using unlicenced copies, resulting in big fines.  My company at that time checked everyone's computer for this.  

Reputable companies need to purchase licensed software, and it't the same with standards.  The cost should be included in a company's overhead.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

HgTX:  an important point.  It's a bit of an idiotic system, similar to the way journal articles are treated in the academic world.  

Take the example of the professor writing a journal article.  The taxpayer funds the professor's salary.  He does the research and writes the paper, because his job is to generate and disseminate "knowledge" for the taxpayer's benefit, as well as to teach students.  His peers at other universities, whose salaries are also paid by the taxpayer, reviews his paper, just as he reviews those of other peers.  He then gets the article published in a journal.  The journal publisher gets the copyright- and if the prof wants reprints of his paper, even for the purpose of teaching his students, his university has to pay the journal for the reprints! And who buys subscriptions to the journals?  Primarily university libraries, of course.  Who funds the university libraries?  THE TAXPAYER!  

Draw a box around the system so that you can identify the money flows into and out of the system, and you soon see that there's a net money flow from the taxpayer to the journal publisher, who does little more than promotion of the journal and of course printing the paper copies.  Pretty inefficient from the taxpayer's perspective, isn't it?  Whose interest does the copyright granted by the STATE to the publishing company serve in this case?

If we're truly interested in the public safety benefit these standards represent, we want the standards widely used and hence widely disseminated.  We can't let an outmoded business model get in the way of that if we really value people's lives and safety.  We need to find another way to run the standards generation and maintenance and dissemination process which doesn't involve the prohibitive fees.  

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Well said, moltenmetal. The organizations that maintain standards are really quite small and spend an inordinate amount of time trying to protect their source of income, while the actual writers and contributors to these standards are mostly volunteers.

A particularly troublesome case are building codes that are adopted into law by reference but you have to pay to read it.

Patents and copyrights are intended to benefit society by encouraging invention and innovation by providing time limited protection to the inventor or creator. In many cases they are used for the opposite effect in order to protect the income of an individual or organization. Did you ever wonder why standards are updated so frequently? There is nothing good or noble about this. It is human nature.  

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

OK Moltenmetal

Those were good arguments! I wont say that i have often felt the same way.

Some new standards such as the European PED and machine directive is now in public domain. Maybe we will eventually see a shift towards this?

Best regards

Morten

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

As a volunteer for a Safety Code, I just want to add that organizations, such as ASME, do run significant expense in staff labour to manage the Code.  yes, volunteers do a significant amount of work, but there are many individuals whose job it is to manage the volunteers and coordinate their work.

Are you suggesting that the government pay for their salaries?  That they should become civil servants?  Furthermore, which government - US Federal Government, Canada, individual States or Provinces, etc?

I submit that such a scheme has been deemed too difficult to manage.  Furthermore, I think that if the government was "footing the bill", then political action (as opposed to the best intentions of learned volunteers) would drive the Codes.  I can point to many countries (China comes to mind) where this is the case, and I, for one, want no part of that.

So, if you want a relatively impartial (or at least balanced) perspective, then industry-driven is the way to go.  That comes hand-in-glove with industry-pay.

Would I like my Codes for free - sure.  Am I willing to pay the price (as described above) that comes with that - absolutely not.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Standards also get updated for sound engineering reasons, it has to be said.
However, design to standard and then look for approvals.
Take marine industry. Lloyds tests ENV1 etc.
Now OK, you need one for each country as you'd expect but you also need one for most of the EU countries (I'm excepting Switzerland, to the best of my knowledge they don't issue marine approvals).
So what happened to the Common Market, never mind the EU, which was all about harmonisation.
Well, national standards are:
a) a source of income
b) protectionist - each standard has some slight differences or each authority has different aspects they emphasise.

So come testing time you might expetc to have to host a dozen or so inspectors.... if you are in Barbados or Hawaii that may be so but in reality, when you are in Scunthorpe or somewhere, you'll get one, maybe. He is then empowered by the other societies to witness on their behalf.

If you make the mistake of organising each one individually then you have a punitive bill and it will add years to the ROI but if you contact them all at once, they will agree this sort of procedure with one inspector representing all.
It is cheaper on expenses fo sure.
It is still a hefty bill but a lot less hassle.
But why all the different European approvals?
Why not a unified global approval for a global industry?
Why Germnaische Lloyd and Lloyds of London, DNV, BV, RINAS and all the rest?

Go figure.


  

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

TGS4 and jmw have excellent points as well.  In a sense, sometimes any widely-accepted standard, regardless how flawed, is better than NO standard- i.e. fifty or a hundred different, non-widely accepted standards into which protectionism and regional preferences can most easily creep.


Not that we don't have that situation now- jurisdictions may adopt some of the ASME codes, ANSI/ASTM etc., but all put their own regional flavour in there.

Protectionism masquerading as safety regulations is indeed a problem.  The Japanese have that down to a science.

Of course, I wouldn't complain if the US federal government started paying ASME's bills so I wouldn't have to.  If an American code or standard becomes the de-facto world standard, perhaps it's the least our American friends can do is foot the bill through their taxes- in return for the unbelievable convenience provided to them by the fact that THEIR standard is so widely accepted by the rest of the world?!

Centralizing standards under government control and funding requires world government- something we don't have.  I guess paying ASME every two years for what amounts to a de-facto internationally accepted standard is better than nothing.  

But let's not pretend that the current system of funding organizations like ASME is not putting lives at risk.  Literally on a weekly basis I see examples of non-compliance which results from non-awareness which can be directly tied to the non-availability of these standards in the hands of ALL those who need them.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

I think the pricing of Codes and Standards puts a lot of them beyond the reach of "Mom and Pop Shop" engineering companies, but they ought to be an easily affordable - and necessary - cost of doing business for any multi-disciplined engineering company that purports to do engineering.

Unless, of course, that multi-disciplined engineering company is led by accountands and MBAs as opposed to P.Eng.'s or PE's.

Not that I am in any way bitter.

Regards,

SNORGY.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

MotenMetal,
an attractive idea on many fronts hat government should underwrite standards.
If they could be persuaded to just foot the bill, that would be OK.
However, if we want standards to be effective and cost effective, we need to keep government, any government, at arms length, sorry, over the horizon.
The risk is that the government would just mess it up.

By the way, not all national differences are simply protectionism it is just that of all the different ways to do something there isn't necessarily just one right way.

Once you accept that the problem is to get everyone to agree on which right solution should become the common solution.
 

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Back to the original post--whether the codes are posted on your intranet depends on whether your company decides to buy a site license to allow everyone in the company access to the same copy of the document.  Sometimes that's a good deal.  Sometimes it's horribly expensive.  Sometimes they buy one electronic copy and put it on a designated workstation that everyone has to physically walk over to in order to read the documents, thus perversely making the electronic version less portable than the paper version, which you could at least pull off the library shelf and take to your own desk.  Sometimes they are reasonable and buy everyone their own copy to use, just like everyone has their own telephone, keyboard, and other basic tools.  This is for you to take up with your management.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies:  FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

jmw:  you're right that some of the regional differences are there for good reason.  But some of the Japanese regs which require certain goods to be made in a "certified" shop, which in very practical terms means ONLY a Japanese shop- sorry, but that's protectionism.

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

Moltenmetal,
you are absolutely right and we have only to look at the way they managed the auto market to see how they managed to sell their cars around the globe and minimise sales of any imports.
There we saw the original standards carefully contrived and then updated to always wrong foot foreign manufacturers.
I can't help thinking that while China may eventually come round to some sort of trade agreements, they will find this a useful model to protect their internal market.

Somehow, the Japanese always managed to dupe the politicians which is another reason why, though there are some good foundations behind your previous proposal, I would find government involvement in standards somewhat undesirable; they aren't smart enough and they will always have some other agenda that runs counter to the domestic manufacturer's and user's interests.

 

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

RE: Why is it ever so difficult to find the standards?

(OP)
Thanks for the replies!!! The debates are interesting! I certainly learned a lot from all of you.

Had intranet in my last company, but it's pretty useless. Don't have intranet in the new company. I needed API standards; I have got everything I needed. :)

The IHS website looks good, but I doubt we will ever subscribe to it...
 

Cutie


 

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources