My understanding is if something was not built as your signed drawings indicated, then you are not liable. If the homeowner and the contractor modified your drawings, they are practicing engineering and you can turn them into your local board.

Robert Billings
www.newrivereng.com

The best and eternal advice: As a Professional you cannot lie, and shall not conseal... So ask your licensing board. They are often very helpful, and if you are in a compromised position, self-reporting is the best possible outcome for a legitimate engineer.

In short, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Were Pascal alive, he's be dialling the phone for you...

SLTA:

Yes. Just write a letter to the building department citing your reasons and send a copy to the client, contractor, and your lawyer.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

I would think, or hope, that you would be held responsible for what you drew, not what they built - unless they built exactly what you drew. Engineering drawings are not discretionary.

Yes, I have had my name removed as EOR, but my circumstances were bizarre beyond Dilbert proportions, and it was a ridiculously difficult process that almost resulted in me suing the companies, the people, my employer, a Regulator, and a Provincial Government involved. I should have, in retrospect; perhaps I would have made enough money that I wouldn't have to still be working today.

What Mike said!

In addition, if you feel the structure is unsafe, ask the building department to put a stop-work order on it and have the site shut down. You've already done that from your perspective, but you have to be careful that you take on a stop work responsibility that you can be held liable for in construction delay claims. You're probably safe in this case, but it is better to have the AHJ make that happen.

Also, once you are satisfied that work has been stopped and you want out, write another letter to the client, contractor, building official and the state board stating the facts and that you are removing yourself from any EOR responsibility and further activity. Copy everything to your lawyer!

Well, I went out to the site yesterday morning and the upper two floors of the house were unsupported, as the full length of the lower exterior wall had been removed and there was absolutely no shoring for the remaining exterior wall (1920s, super-heavy wood and sheathing, etc). Awesome. They just decided to ignore that part of my drawings. So, I called the city inspector out to the site and he totally agreed with me. He put a stop work and a do not enter/unsafe building on it. He was kind of flabbergasted by it... We came up with a shoring solution, which I was going to draw up yesterday afternoon to get to the owner and contractor this morning. Then, the plan was to proceed with the original shoring and beam installation, as shown on my drawings.

The owner called me twice yesterday after I left the site, to ask why we have to do all this shoring and can't we just put in the beam, etc. Seeing as how the baseplates haven't been fabricated for the posts under the replacement beam, she wants to change the beam to a drop beam, and she has decided to switch contractors - um, no, the temp shoring wall needs to go in right away. Then she asked if she can't just put in a post in the middle and be done with it. (This is a 24' long opening!) I reminded her that the house is unstable and no work can be done until the house is shored. Then she blamed me for causing delays in the project, when I'm the one trying to stop the house from falling down or anyone from getting hurt... and I hadn't even been notified that work started back in June, until last Friday afternoon.

Long story short, she decided to terminate the contract with me. So, I'll write all my letters as recommended, and wish her the best of luck finding another engineer in town willing to touch this project as it stands. Yikes. I did also call my state board's lawyer, and he agreed that I did exactly the right thing. So that's good.

Isn't engineering supposed to be one of the non-drama professions? *sigh*

Please remember: we're not all guys!

Good for you. She is just an accident waiting to happen.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

"Isn't engineering supposed to be one of the non-drama professions? *sigh*"

The only non-drama professions are the ones that have no people involved. About the only difference between professions is probably the types of drama or dramaedy seen.

TTFN
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Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

And yet another reminder of WHY an engineer's involvement has become a legislated requirement in many jurisdictions...

Good job. Cuddos for your professional and ethical handling of this train wreck.

Remember to bill her for ALL work you put in, not just what was quoted originally. She is legally obligated to pay for your additional, unplanned, site works. You may even be able to stick a higher rate for emergency services, but I wouldn't do that... I would demand to be paid for all work undertaken right up to the moment she (foolishly) said "stop".

cheers, folks. and CEL - I absolutely charged her for all the time, and included the page of conditions from the contract saying that she has agreed to pay me if she cancels. We'll see how fast that check comes.

It will actually be interesting to follow this from afar. This poor house.

Please remember: we're not all guys!

Nice... I love that you have empathy for the house!

SLTA...

By chance...

Does she have an MBA?

HA SNORGY... Not that I know of. Maybe you should give her an honorary MBA.

Please remember: we're not all guys!

"Isn't engineering supposed to be one of the non-drama professions? *sigh* "

I'm still chuckling over that one.

SLTA,

One day, I'll relate my story about how I removed myself as EOR, and under what circumstances. I just didn't want to hijack your post and do it here.

I am continually dumbfounded by improperly-credentialed, naiive twits who figure they can short-cut the system and engage in the practice of engineering just because they think they are smarter or better than professional engineers in matters specific to engineering. They aren't, and neither should we perpetuate a system in this society that encourages them to continue to believe that they are. We don't let nurses do it to doctors, we don't let vet techs do it to vets, we don't let dental hygienists do it to dentists, we don't let teachers' aides do it to teachers, we don't let paralegals do it to lawyers, we don't let security guards do it to police officers...and yet, much to my own personal disillusionment, we often find ourselves having to modestly explain why technologists or common high school graduates or housewives or - worse - MBAs - shouldn't be given the license to do it to us. I view it as perverse, obscene and blasphemous. When stuff like this happens, we have to slam it hard and stop it.

The main thing is, you acquitted yourself not only with intelligence and grace, but magnanimously as well. Good on you. I suppose that approach is classier than smacking them upside the head with a T-square or something.

I do find it an interesting tangent that your client is a woman. Had the client been male, an outsider may view the client's actions as having sexist motivation.

SNORGY, hijack away!

TheTick, interesting. There are plenty of women who are biased against other women in technical positions, but that's not the vibe I got from her. I'm just glad to be out of it!

Please remember: we're not all guys!

SLTA...

OK...

So, about 5 years ago, I am sitting at my computer working away. A message pops up on my screen from the Provincial Authority Having Jurisdiction (The "Regulator"):
"This email is to advise that your facility design (xxxx-xxxx) has been approved for construction."

I think, "That's odd. I haven't designed anything in that Province for the past 3 years."

So, I email the Regulator. "What facility? What design? What Client / Operating Company? Is there any contact information you can give me?"

Some accurate paraphrasing of telephone conversations ensues below.

[Regulator] "Do you forget what you have designed and for who?"
[SNORGY] "Well, I certainly don't remember this one. What is it and who is it for?"
[Regulator] "Is your name not {SNORGY} and is your Professional Membership Registration number not (xxxxx)?"
[SNORGY] "Yes, and yes."
[Regulator] "Then we have the right person and your facility has been approved for construction."
[SNORGY] "What facility? For who? Who is the Client Company and who can I speak to there?"
[Regulator] "{yyyyyy} is the Client Company. The design by (Engineering Contractor zzzz} has your name, number and seal as the Engineer Of Record, and it has been approved for construction."
[SNORGY] "I don't work for, nor have I ever worked for, {Engineering Contractor zzzz}. There is an obvious error here. Please remove my name as the EOR."
[Regulator] "We cannot do that. It is in the computer database. Once it gets into the computer database, we can't change it."
[SNORGY] "I don't give a rat's ----. Remove my name as EOR even if you have to blow up your server to do it."
[Regulator] "We suggest you speak to someone at {yyyyyy}. We cannot alter the computer database records."
[SNORGY] "I will do that now."

**click***

[SNORGY] "Yes. I would like to speak with {contact person at yyyyyy}."
[{yyyyyy}] "Good job, thank you for your efforts. Construction starts next week."
[SNORGY] "Well, have fun with that, but I didn't design anything for you. Ever."
[{yyyyyy} "Sure you did. I have your Seal and Professional Membership Number on the cover page of the application right here on behalf of {Engineering Contractor zzzz}."
[SNORGY] "Well, I'll tell you the same thing I told {Regulator}. I don't work for {zzzz} and I don't know a thing about this facility application."
[{yyyyyy}] "Really? Then why did you stamp and submit it?"
{SNORGY] "OK, never mind, I will take this up with the Professional Association in the Province of {wwww}."

**click**

[SNORGY] "Hello. Yes, I need to immediately have my name removed as the EOR for the project for {yyyyyy} designed by {zzzz} that was recently registered by {Regulator} in the Province of {wwww}."
[Association] "Why?"
[SNORGY] "There has been a mistake. I did not do the design, I did not submit the application, I have never done any work for {yyyyyy} and I am not, nor have I ever been, employed by {zzzz}."
[Association] "So how did {Regulator} approve the application?"
[SNORGY] "Apparently nobody knows, other than it has been entered into the computer database where it is impossible to change the data entered therein."
[Association] "Oh. That sounds like a bad situation. We cannot do anything to help you, but we sincerely hope that you can resolve it shortly."
[SNORGY] "Perhaps then I can ask you to immediately cancel my membership as a Professional Engineer within the Professional Association in the Province of {wwww}, so that construction cannot proceed."
[Association} "You have paid your membership dues and are in good standing. Your membership will automatically lapse if you elect not to renew approximately 7 months from now."
[SNORGY] "Listen. Cancel my membership. Now."
[Association] "No need for that. We understand your frustration. We recommend you seek legal counsel. Here is a number for a good law firm. The first half hour is free."
[SNORGY] "I will call them now."

**click**

[SNORGY] "Hello. This is my situation."
{Law Firm] "That is indeed cause for legal action. You should find out how this happened. We would be happy to help once you do. Thank you for the call."
[SNORGY} "I will do that. I will advise invoicing instructions shortly."

**click**

So, SNORGY does some digging internally within SNORGY's employer's offices. As it turns out, one of the "Project Engineers" (who is not an engineer, has not finished a diploma as a technologist, and who is working on obtaining certification in the field of Criminology - thank goodness not pursuing an MBA - and yet, who is nonetheless placed in charge of professional engineers in this workplace) instructed the Regulatory personnel to take SNORGY's registration information and copy of the electronic file of SNORGY's Professional Engineering stamp, open up an account using SNORGY's identification with the automated computer database system at {Regulator}, and submit the application in SNORGY's name on behalf of {zzzz}, for whom SNORGY has never worked. Somewhat irritated by this development, SNORGY calls an immediate internal meeting with his employer's senior management, the supervisor of the "Project Engineer" involved, the head of the employer's Regulatory personnel, and, of course, the "Project Engineer". What follows is an accurate paraphrasing of the conversation in the meeting room.

[SNORGY] "All right, listen up you ------- idiots. You might think that it's perfectly acceptable to do this, but let me explain what this constitutes, in my mind."
[Senior Management] "No need to be upset, you are making an unnecessarily big deal out of nothing here. Relax."
[SNORGY] "Are you clowns freaking kidding me? This is fraud, at my expense and at the expense of tarnishing my credibility as a Professional Engineer in the Province of {wwww}."
[SNORGY] "I worked hard to obtain my accreditation as a Professional Engineer, and it's disturbing that you idiots trivialize what is mine and what it means."
[SNORGY] "This country has laws that deal with this kind of thing. I have engaged legal counsel and I will be holding every moron in this room accountable for this."
[SNORGY] "Unless you immediately fire "Project Engineer"."
[Senior Management] "We are not going to do that. What we will do is ask "Project Engineer" to apologize."
["Project Engineer"] "Heck no, I am not apologizing. I did what I had to do to get the job done."
[SNORGY] "You stole my identity and my professional credentials and have left me in a situation where I have to negotiate with the Regulator, the Association and the Government to remove me as EOR."
[SNORGY] "You should be fired. And, you are working towards certification in what field? Good luck with that."
[Senior Management] "SNORGY, you are making way too much out of this. It's nothing. Besides, we are definitely not going to fire "Project Engineer", apology or otherwise."
[SNORGY] "OK, I gotta ask, why the heck not?"
[Senior Management] "{"Project Engineer"} brings in revenue to the company."

**meeting adjourned**

So, now SNORGY knows where he stands. He types the following correspondence to {Regulator} and {Association}:

[SNORGY] "Per your instructions, I am working on resolving this issue myself. I have engaged the services of {Law Firm} who will be preparing paperwork for you in an upcoming legal action."
[SNORGY] "Please advise, to which one of you two Organizations shall I submit their first and all subsequent invoices?"

**fast forward two months**

SNORGY was able to convince {Regulator} and {Association} to figure out a way to edit the computer database records and remove SNORGY's name as EOR. SNORGY now works elsewhere. "Project Engineer" still works for {Past Employer}, because "Project Engineer" still brings in revenue.

And people wonder why I get frustrated with non-credentialed idiots running engineering companies and having dominion over engineers.

And, no, I didn't make any of this up.

Oh my GOD Snorgy. I thought I'd seen some sh*t, but that takes the cake! Just WOW.

HO.LY. CRAP.

Please remember: we're not all guys!

OK busy posts


"We don't let nurses do it to doctors"

Yeah, we do. They're called nurse practitioners (NPs) in the US. With no more than a measly 6 months of clinical training, they are let loose on the populace, supposedly able to almost everything a real doctor does, but supposedly under the supervision of said doctor (yeah, right). My wife is a doctor, and has told me horror stories, including one where she had to make an emergency call to the patient to get their butt to the ER because the NP misdiagnosed the patient, on my wife's license and malpractice insurance.

" I get frustrated with non-credentialed idiots running engineering companies and having dominion over engineers"

I don't think that it's because they're non-credentialed that's the issue; it's simply that they're unethical and unprincipled. Identity theft is not a trivial matter, and you don't need credentials to figure that out. Yes, you had idiots, but they probably would have been idiots even if they had credentials, since credentials don't change your personality.

TTFN
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Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

SLTA-does your work qualify in your state to allow you to place a mechanic's lien on the house? Might want to do that, if possible, as leverage to get paid for your additional work.

In some of the southern States (one in particular comes to mind), it is rumored that a common criteria for determining whether or not to buy such a house is...

...

Whether it is new or leans.

And why is this fiasco not before the provioncial licensing office? I would be on my State Board's ass to prosecute in a heartbeat here.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

SLTA....good job. You did it all just right!

SNORGY....thanks for sharing. I left a relatively high level position in an international engineering firm because non-credentialed "Project Managers" were given equal status to principal engineers and could override engineering decisions for the sake of expedience and/or profitability. That change was led by the accountants who infiltrated upper management and drove the decisions. I have never regretted the decision.

msquared48

There are two reasons why I didn't escalate this to the Professional Association level, one based on past experience and one purely selfish and personal.

(1) Past Experience: When I have been exposed to questionable practices in the past and have contacted the Association(s) for advice or guidance, I have been advised that they would not encourage me to formalize the complaint; in other words, they have told me they would rather not get involved - in one instance, I was encouraged to simply resign my employment and seek work elsewhere. I am not especially enamoured with the helpfulness of any of our Provincial Professional Associations, but "the law" requires membership within those Associations in order to practice engineering.
(2) Selfish / Personal: My wife and I simply decided that, on the basis of my employability in the marketplace, it was easier to just cut my losses and move on; we have better ways to spend or time than invite this level of conflict and drama into our lives. Yes, selfish, I know, but she is nonetheless affected in a corollary fashion by whatever conflict I bring upon myself.

You have to be very careful lodging formal complaints. In the words of Elton John and Bernie Taupin:

"I looked for support from the rest of my friends...For their vanishing tricks they get ten out of ten.". It is so true. Colleagues have families and fears and cling to their jobs and are disinclined to stand behind you in instances such as this, whereas the offending parties can simply disavow all knowledge of anything and deny everything, leaving the onus of proof on the sole complainant. You have to take stock and assess how difficult you will be making it on yourself when you become a whistle blower. Then, play the scenario out. What would a successful outcome (i.e., proving the validity of my complaint) have given rise to? Continued employment in an environment where my relationships with others in management and with colleagues are seriously compromised, surrounded by individuals who lack the same levels of courage and conviction that I have because the protection of their own personal circumstances trump standing up for what is truly ethical and right. You can't begrudge them, but sometimes you just have to take stock, look around, cut your losses and look for a place that more closely aligns with your own values.

Snorgy:

That is pathetic regarding your regulatory agency - then it is all about the membership money to them and not about protecting the public - but I did have much the same experience when my stamp was stolen twice in earlier years. They merely a letter to the offender telling them not to do it again. Thst being said though, if it ever did go to court, that still was one apple on my side of the table.

It is interesting to note here that protecting the public is opur primary directive once licensed, but apparently not the licensing agency.

Best wishes, and thanks for sharing the experience.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

Snorgy…

I would be concerned that your previous employer and their "project manager" might still be using your stamp. Regardless, those people should be in prison.

Fred

==========
"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill

CAUTION: Potentially controversial statements to follow.

I am always amazed when I see any organization try to make an administrative fix to a criminal matter. The current issue of sexual assault on US college campuses is an extreme example. Why are colleges pursuing internal, administrative actions to address something that is clearly criminal and should be prosecuted by law enforcement, not sanctioned by some administrative body?

Likewise with the actions of the board in Snorgy's story. Clearly, this is beyond any simple breach of ethics. A man's identity has been stolen. It is a criminal act and should be treated as such.

TheTick, cheers. I've always felt strongly that all assaults should be handled by the criminal courts, etc, but the reasons they aren't are long and varied. I think from the school's perspective, it's about keeping it all hush-hush.

There's a move to get the Princeton Review to include data on sexual assault rates in their rankings of colleges. A great idea, but I'm not holding my breath.

Please remember: we're not all guys!

Snorgy, as a young Canadian Engineer that is a truly disappointing story to hear. Thanks for sharing.

I've been personally involved in Princeton Review's college rating process. It was embarrassing to be associated with it.

CANPRO,

Don't get discouraged. Follow your engineering ethics and your moral compass and you will be able to steer clear of those kinds of situations and those kinds of outfits.

TheTick,

I agree, but I was tired of the drama and the crap. In retrospect, a cop-out on my part.

fel3,

It was a result of this one very incident that the Provincial Professional Association involved made it much more difficult to skirt their "system". I also, now, insist on manual stamping of everything, using my own stamp and my own inkpad. The electronic CADD or .tiff image files of stamps that designers sometimes use to scale into their title blocks, they are definitely a thing of my past.

Snorgy…

Years ago I was a principal in a small civil engineering firm that did mostly municipal infrastructure design and serving as contract city engineers and special district engineers. We joint-ventured with an out-of-state firm (at their request) to do civil engineering for one of their major commercial development clients. They had no experience or, initially, licenses in our state and thought it would be best to team with a local firm rather than try to get up-to-speed all on their own. The three principals from each firm became the six principals for the JV. They transferred a couple of their employees to our location and we loaned a couple of our employees to get things started and then we hired locally as needed, eventually reaching about 25 people. I had no day-to-day role in managing the JV (one principal from each firm handled that), but I did get involved on a regular basis doing QC reviews and providing technical assistance to the JV's design teams (in my experience, most land development engineers are not very technically adept, so my help was sorely needed at times). I also chewed out one of the JV's senior engineers for blaming (publicly and loudly) my lead surveyor for a problem that was 100% his own. I found out it was not the first time this had happened and I would have fired him on the spot if I had had the jurisdiction.

Back to the issue at hand — The commercial development client required that all drawings be stamped and signed by the lead principal from the other firm, which made sense because they were his client for many years before the JV. However, that principal's normal schedule was one week in his home office, one week in our office, and one week traveling to project sites and visiting with local agencies. As you can imagine, this made timely stamping and signing of drawings to meet project schedules a real problem.

One day, about three or four years into the JV, one of the drafters for the JV asked me for a private conversation. He was concerned about their process for stamping and signing drawings, but he didn't know the regulations and wanted my advice. He told me that one of the engineering technicians (the first "designer" transferred out by the other firm) had engineering stamps for every state the other firm's lead principal was registered in (including ours) and a drawer full of sticky-backs with his signature. So, when the lead principal wasn't in our office, she could get the drawings "stamped and signed" and sent out just based on a phone call from him. The drafter wanted to know if that was OK. I told him "H*LL NO" and that it was illegal in all jurisdictions for a non-engineer to wield an engineer's stamp, not just our state, and signatures weren't legit because they weren't original. He told me that it hadn't always been that way, only the last year-and-a-half or so. They had devised this procedure to save a couple days on the back-and-forth required for FedEx, a final review, etc.

Based on my past dealings with the other firm's principals, which had started out good but were heading downhill, I decided that a grand gesture would be more effective than a typical protest. I told the drafter to wait until the designer went home for evening and to bring me the engineering stamps, the stamp pad, and all the sticky-backs he could find and that I would lock them in a drawer and wait for the SH*T to hit the fan.

About a week later, the SH*T hit the fan. The designer was frantically scurrying around the office looking for the stamps and sticky-backs and was having no luck. A couple hours into her scurrying, she decided to check on our side of the office since she had had no luck on her side. When she asked me if I had seen the stamps and sticky-backs, I said, "Yes, they're in my locked drawer and that's where they are going to stay." I then explained to her that what she and the lead principal were doing was illegal, that I hadn't worked so hard for my license to see it rendered meaningless by their procedure, yada, yada, yada. Her response was, "But, we have a deadline." I told her she was going to miss her deadline. In less than 30 minutes I was on the phone with the lead principal, who was even more furious, but I told him the same story. I also told him that he and designer didn't cease and desist, I would turn him, her, and the JV firm into the state for disciplinary action. Since the JV firm was a cash cow, this threat stopped him cold. The problem was fixed to my satisfaction and I did spot checks to make sure there were no lapses.

However, this was just one of the many problems with the JV that caused me to sell my interest in both firms and move on to other opportunities.

==========
"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill

fel3,

You went to the appropriate lengths - more so than I, faced with similar circumstances, might have done. You put your butt on the line.

I do regret not taking as strong a stand as you did, or as others have suggested that I should have in my circumstance.

I did, in my young and rebellious days, once write a letter to the then President of our Professional Association in response to an article he had authored in the Association's monthly newspaper. Every month, on page 3 of that newspaper, a caricature of the President's face appeared in the heading of the article. After 6 pages into my letter, my message was that I used Page 3 to paper-train my Rottweiler puppy, with great success. To his credit, he took it graciously and didn't punt me out of the Association. In fact, the article and my response were apparently posted in the Association's offices for about a year. The class he showed earned my respect, but although I might have matured a bit over the years, I am still not convinced that I am a member of an Association that is as committed to supporting its membership in the pursuit of measuring up to the very yardstick that it mandates itself to measure us by. Perhaps we are all conflict-averse by nature (well...not me, maybe...but I've paid for that over the years).

Snorgy…

I had the benefit of being a senior officer in both firms and having a financial stake in both firms, so I had a bigger stick to wield than you did in your circumstance. We all know money is important, but I get really frustrated with people who don't think integrity is even more important. That's one reason I didn't become an attorney.

==========
"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill

i've never been in the situation, but i would hope that a building official would revoke or stopwork a permit if a design professional of record walks in and says 'never heard of the job' until the matter cleared itself up...... if not so much that it would be the right thing to do.... but to protect their bureaucratic job....

So how does it work if you leave a job where you have designed prototype structures that are repeated time after time? I may soon find myself in this situation. I suspect they will keep using my design and simply put another engineer's stamp on it. Come to think of it, I have several completed projects sitting on the shelf that have my stamp on them. It doesn't seem very ethical to just put someone else's stamp on something they never designed.

OSU this is how it works.... the person who follows will review your design comps and throw you under the bus to your former coworkers for each and every missing note... and maybe point out a few of your less conservative assumptions to your former boss to demonstrate their easy understanding of what took you so long to do..... OR.... they say the file is a mess and they can't figure up from down in it and get to bill # weeks reverse engineering you're stuff...

Nah my boss will just slap his stamp on it and go on.

If that's what your boss does, it's his problem, not yours!

I said in a meeting once...to a client...
Work is that commodity that is so easy to criticize, and yet, so difficult to do. Ergo, you should be thankful that I am the one DOING it.

The same holds true for the incoming critics, whoever they might be.

Just recently, scarcely months ago, one of my former employer`s clients came, coincidentally, to the place where I was currently employed and asked them to review the design. The engineer who was assigned to it was one of my employees, and this individual immediately approached it with the bias that ``...this is wrong...that is wrong...what the heck were these idiots thinking when...``. Oddly enough, the work being criticized was, yes, mine, from when I worked at the old place. I spent two weeks, off and on, patiently explaining everything and the reasons why things were the way they were, and asked the engineer to run some process simulations to evaluate the equipment (a line heater) in question. A couple of hours later, the engineer came into my office with the results, which, oddly enough, agreed to within 2% with the calculations I had meanwhile done by hand on my white board and, also oddly enough, showed that the original work was indeed correct.

Lesson to be learned:

People ought not to be in too big a hurry to throw the originator`s work under the bus. By and large, most engineers are indeed not stupid, and there are usually very good reasons why even the things that look odd make perfect sense once you take the time to acquaint yourself with the bigger picture.

As for prototyping and then ``designing by Xerox all subsequent units``, every time I stamp something, it is site-specific, tag-number-specific, project-number-specific or tied to some unique identifier. That certainly creates some frustration for clients who want to ``design a typical and use it anywhere``, but it`s a position I don`t budge from. Not everyone`s line of work affords them that avenue (cars or machines, for example) but, if that`s an option, it`s the best option.

I supposed that it partly boils down to whether anyone, after the fact, can completely know what the assumptions and conditions the original designer used. Even in the case of an established building or structural code, there's almost always some interpretability involved, or even completely undocumented requirements. Given the lack of a comprehensive knowledge of the initial conditions, it would be rare for someone else to come up with the same design.

TTFN
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Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!