Chapter 4:Civil and Structural Engineer

Factories and warehouses:Chapter 4
There are many civil and structural engineeing consultants in your neighbourhood.Just walk around the shops or offices near your house or your office,you may find them.

You may also find them from the Yellow Pages , the Super Pages or the Association of Consulting Engineers Malaysia (ACEM).



Call a few consultants and get them to quote their fees. You may also get some tips on the charges from the Board of Engineers website.

Having selected the civil and structural engineering consultant, you are now ready to put your plan on the factory and warehouse on paper.

Provide the civil and structural engineering consultant the requirements and specifications of your factory and warehouse and he will soon working on the conceptual design.

The following lists are the requirements and specifications I usually obtained from my clients:

1.Factory area needed (Production area, Machineries area,row material storage,finish goods storage,pakaging area,QAQC area,Production Manager office,loading and unloading bays, TNB substation,toilets,surau and ablution,canteen and etc)

2.Warehouse area needed(Storage space for raw materials and finished goods, loading and unloading bays, store manager and purchasing manager offices, toilets, surau and ablution, canteen and etc.)

3.Office areas needed( Reception, customer discussion area, sales and marketing office, account office, managers office, board meeting room, secretary office and managing director room ,etc.)

4.Office ,factory and warehouse facade design.

5.External works(Guardhouses,visitors toilets,refuse bin chamber,landscape,fencing, entrance gate, signboard, hydrant pillars, hosereel boxes, drains, perimeter water pipes, roads and etc.)

The civil and structural engineer usually take about 2 weeks to 1 month to complete his conceptual design. Some will bring along few perspective drawings for discussion.

After a few rounds of discussions and amendments to the conceptual designs, the civil and structural engineer is ready for the preparation of the drawings for submission.

Few years ago, all the local authorities in Selangor have set up their ONE STOP CENTRE (OSC)to check, accept and process the building plans.

So, after the conceptual design stage of the work, the civil and structural engineer will obtain the services of other professionals such as ; Town planner, mechanical and electrical enginnering consultant, landscape architect and /or interior designer to prepare a complete set of building plans for submission to the OSC.

The approval of the building plans depends on the workload of the individual local authorities. From my experience, it range from 2 to 6 months.

While waiting for the approval, the civil and structural engineer will prepare tenders for the tenderers to quote the prices of the construction.

I will elaborate more on the types of submission plans and tendering process in the subsequent chapters, after all the chapters concerning the introduction of professionals like town planner,M&E consulting engineer,landscape architect and interior designer.

Next......Town Planner
Posted by:
Ir. C.M.Chong
Perunding Asatec
(Civil and structural engineerign consultant)
Petaling Jaya
Email: asatecsb@gmail.com