Jump to content

Book: arch CAD drafting standards and conventions


Recommended Posts

I've been looking out for some time for a book that focuses on international (i.e. non-U.S.) CAD draughting standards and conventions.

Does anyone have any recommendations in this regard? The books I have come across are either North American or tend to focus on other things (such as space planning design and ergonomics, etc.) and only cover CAD draughting standards in passing.

Link to comment

Working Drawings Handbook by Keith Styles. The Architectural Press, London. ISBN 0 85139 712 3

Although written for manual drafting the basic communication principles still apply (eg. drawing appropriately for the scale of the drawing - a point often not appreciated by those who have never experienced manual drafting).

Also worth looking at are these two two GLC manuals:

- GLC Good Practice Details

- GLC Detailing for Building Construction

Both from The Architectural Press, London.

Link to comment
Well, the classic EU standard is Neufert. Both UK and the Continent.

Your age is showing, Robert!

Actually, the Neufert (maybe there are other Neuferts than the Bible of my youth, which nicely meshed in with the Giedion Bible) does not deal much with drafting standards.

The Metric Handbook used to be the worldwide reference in that respect, but the focus of that is also in design solutions and such.

Drafting standards vary wildly. The long discussion about rigid insulation is just an indication. And what is drafting! One also has to know about the building industry standards.

Link to comment

Petri, the Neufert mentions all norms employed, while focusing on the content. The norms are translated according to the localization, so they vary as to the edition.

Robert is right. It is the defacto standard for Europe.

When we do the Architectural State Exam, in Italy, that is the only book we are allowed to bring. Together with another one for city planning norms.

orso

Link to comment

Christiaan, the book you are looking for has to be written, there is nothing on the market.

AEC offers you a LAYER structure and a filenaming structure.

Neufert is a disignguideline but no standard. if it goes to court you can not rely on Neufert.

YOU have to create the standard in your designhandbook and your partners consultant or .... has to deliver in accordance. if you are not in the position to create a designhandbook and follow up your orderer shall give you the standards.

a designhandbook shall include all, from filestructure to lineweight.

as allways what you dont request will not happen.

have a nice day

kalimera from greece

Link to comment

Christiaan, I will email you a PDF document that closely parallels the Australian Standard for Architectural Drawings. Most Australian Standards are very close to their UK equivalents (reflecting our historical links) and therefore it will probably be fairly close to the British Standard. (It is also very close to the Working Drawings Handbook by Keith Styles that I cited in an earlier post. I highly recommend it to you as a source.)

Some questions:

- Have you checked what the various Government Department's standards are?

- Does the RIBA have a proscribed or recommended standard?

- Why hasn't your firm purchased the ISO standards you allude to?

Link to comment
Christiaan, the book you are looking for has to be written, there is nothing on the market.

AEC offers you a LAYER structure and a filenaming structure.

Neufert is a disignguideline but no standard. if it goes to court you can not rely on Neufert.

YOU have to create the standard in your designhandbook and your partners consultant or .... has to deliver in accordance. if you are not in the position to create a designhandbook and follow up your orderer shall give you the standards.

a designhandbook shall include all, from filestructure to lineweight.

as allways what you dont request will not happen.

have a nice day

kalimera from greece

You seem to misunderstand me. I'm not looking to *create* office standards for ourselves, I'm looking to bring our office standards more into line with international conventions and standards.

Link to comment
Christiaan, I will email you a PDF document that closely parallels the Australian Standard for Architectural Drawings.

Thanks Mike.

Have you checked what the various Government Department's standards are?
Which departments? Why would that be relevant?

Does the RIBA have a proscribed or recommended standard?
I haven't asked. My assumption has been that they'll point to the ISO standards (which are also BS standards).

Why hasn't your firm purchased the ISO standards you allude to?

Because I haven't actually seen a copy and they're not exactly cheap. I need to see a some samples or a copy before advising such a purchase.

Link to comment

I understand that the Finnish drafting standards are being (or will be) reviewed with CAD in general and BIM/Product Modeling in specific in mind. (I'm not exactly in the inner circle, so this is based deduction, hearsay and snippets of information!)

Many conventions that are based on manual drafting are both irrelevant and difficult to apply. (Not that using the Batt Insulation Tool would be any more difficult than using a stencil & ink pen, but nevertheless.)

If the standards in your country are counterproductive or onerous, it might be a good idea to let your professional body know your opinion.

As an example: in my last projects in Australia, I printed all required drawing sets in colour. Roses were red, violets were blue. Batt insulation was light yellow, rigid insulation darker. Plasterboard was gray, MDF was brown. And so on. In short, I completely ignored standards and conventions - and both contractors and blokes were as happy as Larry and Bob was my uncle.

C'mon! Chomp a cigar and be a revolucionary!

Link to comment

Christiaan,

there are only national standards like german, english and finish.

there are national organisations and companys like DIN and... that are publishing there standards for money.

there is no book on the market you are looking for .

a collection of all europian standards(drafting) will cost you some thousand Euros.

peter

Link to comment

Try understanding the message.

1. There are only national standards like german, english and finish

- ergo, there is not even a European standard, not to mention a global one

2. There is no book on the market you are looking for

- all the National standards are not available as a single, cheap paperback volume that even your firm could afford

3. A collection of all europian standards(drafting) will cost you some thousand Euros

- you have to buy all the standards separately from the National Standardisation Bodies

Edited by Petri
Link to comment

BY PETRI: "As an example: in my last projects in Australia, I printed all required drawing sets in colour. Roses were red, violets were blue. Batt insulation was light yellow, rigid insulation darker. Plasterboard was gray, MDF was brown. And so on. In short, I completely ignored standards and conventions - and both contractors and blokes were as happy as Larry and Bob was my uncle.

C'mon! Chomp a cigar and be a revolucionary! "

There is somethng to this, Christiaan. The aging counterrevolutionary in me agrees. If the drawings read well and communicate well who cares? I realize that part of communicating well is based on conventions/standards but with a few callouts....... and besides, the guys reading these are not stupid. So let 'er rip!

Link to comment

Which all goes to prove the point that Petri is making - the purpose of the drawing is to communicate your intent to those who will actually build it. Using a graphic 'style' that they know and/or understand is what's important. Drawing to some artificial standard that they don't know or understand could be very risky.

Link to comment
1) ISO 128 is an international standard

It is indeed. In my experience, all civilized countries' standards mainly comply with it, but some countries have their idiosyncracies so the ISO standard is not ratified as such.

A fairly common point of (Dutch) National Pride is the use of centimeters in dimensioning.

2) I gathered that already; I implied as much in my first post to this thread.

---

You did, too, but then things got a bit mixed up, don't you think?

3) No, you can buy ISO 128 parts directly from ISO.

Yes, you can, but the Gondwanalandian permit authority may still insist that you submit drawings using the local standard.

Lucky for me, the ever-so-laid-back permit authorities in the land of Oz were not too tight on this. Of course, I submitted the permit drawings on Friday afternoons when they were already getting ready for Friday drinks at the local.

No, I did NOT call any rounds!

Link to comment

One reason is that I'm not particularly interested in reinventing the wheel. We need a standard in our office and rather than make our own up as we go along (and there are always different opinions about what's convention and what's not) we might as well use one that's already invented and widely available. Another reason is that the construction workforce in the UK is from all over the world.

I agree that our drawings should be readable and of a graphic style that's understandable to the British industry, and, as I understand it, ISO 128 won't preclude us from achieving that.

Link to comment

As another serf of the EU: if you implement the ISO standard, you should be a lumberjack and, hence, OK. I'd like to think that your QC can refer to EU competition rules and successfully claim that if your documentation complies with ISO, an adverse decision would be in violation of the EU directives, null and void.

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...