Veterans Administration Work

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Author Message Richard Gonser AIA CSI CCCA SCIP Senior Member Username: rich_gonser Post Number: 67 Registered: 11-2008 Posted on Saturday, June 07, 2014 - 01:22 pm:    I have a client that has a VA project here in California and has asked me for a fee to do the project. It is large enough to be using BIM(Revit) and will need a full book project manual. What can anyone tell me about working with the VA and how much time can I expect versus a "normal" school/hospital project? Right now it looks to be 2-4 times "normal" due to having to edit their master. (I am fairly proficient at SpecLink-e.) Also, they state one can use SpecLink-e or e-Specs. Yet they provide a seemingly incomplete set of master specifications. Do they fill in the rest of Division 1 with the General Conditions or do I combine it with my master? What about BIM Integration? Is it required to do all that live cross connection? Thanks in advance, any help would be appreciated. ken hercenberg Senior Member Username: khercenberg Post Number: 768 Registered: 12-2006 Posted on Saturday, June 07, 2014 - 01:57 pm:    All good questions. Division 01: It will depend on the VA Project Manager. Your client probably doesn't have any idea what to expect with this so you should clarify in your proposal what you are or are not providing. If you can put in an Allowance or Add Alternate for Division 01, that would make sense. Remember, this is the VA. Nothing is like anything else you've ever worked on. BIM: I'll have to leave this for others to answer. My last VA project was almost 2 years ago and I'm sure they've changed their protocols since then. More importantly, you need to find out whether you will be subjected to Dr. Checks reviews. The VA has an incredibly onerous quality process that adds many hours to your time spent. Ask your client about your involvement in VA quality reviews. If they are not familiar with the VA, they may not realize the amount of time sucked away by this process. I've literally had to spend 2 to 3 days responding to comments and being available by phone to address them during the resulting conference. Make sure to find out whether Dr. Checks will be involved for every deliverable and how many deliverables are involved. Also make sure what is required for each deliverable. I've had to provide full length specs at 35%. Specsintact: Several years ago I worked on a large VA facility that had to be done in Specsintact. While e-Specs supports Specsintact, you still need to know how to use the Specsintact software as well. While some embrace Specsintact, I know folks who would call this a deal-breaker. Lynn Javoroski FCSI CCS LEEDŽ AP SCIP Affiliate Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 1827 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 01:13 pm:    It's been 6-7 years since I worked on a VA project, but they did require specs at 35% - redlined, so they could see what you were taking out and what you were adding. That was a major pain. At 50%, you could remove those redlines, but that also took time. Margaret G. Chewning FCSI CCS Senior Member Username: presbspec Post Number: 252 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 02:42 pm:    VA specs are done in Word instead of SpecsIntact. The "redlines" can be accomplished using the Tracking mode and can be turned on and off with a toggle in the review menu on the ribbon. At the end they can all be accepted with a toggle command also. When working with any client that "is very particular" I will sometimes use that method just to keep track of changes they are requesting. Ronald L. Geren, FCSI, AIA, CCS, CCCA, SCIP Senior Member Username: specman Post Number: 1225 Registered: 03-2003 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 04:09 pm:    Richard, are you sure he has the project and is not on a waiting list? On a serious note, e-Specs is actually ARCOM MasterSpec, so I would think that using MasterSpec directly, rather than through a third party, should be okay if you're already a subscriber. Ron Geren, FCSI, AIA, CCS, CCCA, SCIP www.specsandcodes.com Richard Gonser AIA CSI CCCA SCIP Senior Member Username: rich_gonser Post Number: 68 Registered: 11-2008 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 04:23 pm:    Thanks for the input on e-Specs. I'm on SpecLink-e and love it. I am not a fan of the overstated wordiness of MasterSpec. In my view the more words one tries to use to describe something, the less you know about it. Yes they do have the project. ken hercenberg Senior Member Username: khercenberg Post Number: 771 Registered: 12-2006 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 04:24 pm:    Actually e-Specs supports a number of spec masters. See http://e-specs.com/products/e-specs-master-specification-support/ for more info. Margaret, I was just as surprised as you when I was told we were doing a VA project in Specsintact but that's what it was. Not a happy year by any means. This was circa 2005. All of the other VA projects I've worked on since were done in Word using the VA master; still not a great option. Lynn Javoroski FCSI CCS LEEDŽ AP SCIP Affiliate Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 1828 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 05:00 pm:    Last time I did a VA project, their Word specs were not set up for automatic numbering; what a huge pain that was! Tomas Mejia, CCS, CCCA, LEED Senior Member Username: tmejia Post Number: 53 Registered: 09-2003 Posted on Wednesday, June 11, 2014 - 08:18 pm:    I did some VA Specs a couple of years ago. The E-Specs VA version was based on the VA Masters not MasterSpec. E-Specs also provides a VA Style Guide so you can format a spec section with a couple of clicks of the mouse.