Old timer at my last shop swore by his method for spacing rebar.

Jim, who had been drafting for 35 years, told me to always use a 6 inch spacing on concrete slabs no matter what the plans said. I followed his advice on a parking garage in Cleveland last year and the inspector flagged it because the engineer called for 8 inches. Cost me a whole day of rework and a $500 penalty. Has anyone else gotten burned by taking advice from a veteran that was just their old habit?

3 comments

3 Comments

troy83225d ago

Hold on, "cost me a whole day of rework and a $500 penalty"? That's nuts man. I would have been livid. Listening to that old timer cost you real time and real money, all because he was stuck in his ways from 30 years ago. You can't just ignore the engineer's plans on something like rebar spacing. That's like driving a semi with one tire flat because your buddy said it rides smoother that way. I don't get how some guys think their personal experience overrides the actual stamped drawings. Sorry you had to learn that the hard way, but at least you know now not to take rebar advice from someone who probably learned his trade before calculators existed. lol

sam_murphy3925d ago

Never trust anyone who ignores the damn plans.

cora_scott7725d ago

Respect that you feel that way, but I gotta say I see it a little different. Plans are important, yeah, but they ain't the only thing that matters on a job site. Sometimes a guy with 30 years of experience has seen something the engineer didn't think about, like how the ground shifts after a heavy rain or how certain materials behave different in the heat. That old timer might've saved me from a bigger problem down the line, even if his method looked wrong on paper. I've had plans that were dead wrong before, and sticking to them blindly would've cost me way more than a penalty. It's not about ignoring the plans completely, it's about knowing when to listen to someone who's been in the dirt longer than you.