Posted by Chris Irwin
on 11/13/2010
“Where’s the wire between the generator and the BMS module?” asks customer X.
Contractor Y replies, “The plans didn’t show a wire between the two, so I didn’t pull it in.”
The above conversation is the start of an unfortunate headache. A critical detail missed in the design phase. A change order is issued, finger pointing begins and now everyone’s looking for someone to blame. So who’s truly at fault? The designer who didn’t note the wire? The generator rep that didn’t show the specs required for a BMS tie in? The customer who didn’t mention they wanted integration between the generator and their BMS system during the design phase?
Chances are it’s not any one persons fault. Perhaps the customer never mentioned they had intensions of integrating third party devices together at the design phase. The customer just assumes it’s part of the package, so why bring it up? Maybe the generator company didn’t provide the spec sheet for the communications module. Or possibly the designer flat out missed it and didn’t put it on the plans.
To avoid these late in the game hiccups, it’s critical as a designer to investigate the systems you’re responsible for with a giant magnifying glass. Ask questions, lots of them. When you get answers, ask questions about the answers you just received. Does the generator have remote monitoring capabilities? What wires are required to facilitate this option? What software is necessary to access it? Are there any network requirements? How does the customer plan to use this? Is training required? The list goes on. Most importantly, don’t just show a generator on a set of plans without investigating what bells and whistles the customer expects to use.
Other details often overlooked in the design phase are the racked hardware connectivity needs. A perfect example is a configuration detail regarding storage arrays. Hypothetical situation: The customer provides specs on the unit, which call for redundant OM3 fiber feeds. Seems easy enough, specify 12 strands of OM3 fiber from the array to the core switching equipment and you’re left with 8 strands for future growth. Seems pretty straight forward, right? It would be, if the customer plans on implementing the standard configuration. But what if the customer planned on an alternate configuration, yet didn’t know that the connectivity requirements differ from the standard specs for the unit? Who’s to blame? The customer provided the specs and the designer accounted for them in their design. Unbeknownst to the customer or the designer, this configuration won’t work on game day.
How can this be avoided? If I’m driving a design, I try to go a step beyond translating specs onto paper. I’m definitely not a storage array expert, but I’m aware that multiple configurations are available for them (and most other equipment for that matter). It’s not up to me as the designer to determine which configuration is best for the customer, but I will/do take on the role of asking the appropriate questions to the customer so they can get these answers. By asking these types of questions, I enable the customer to work with their equipment vendor on specific system details, which in turn enables my design to be bullet proof on this section of the design. It adds slightly more work on the front end, but saves headaches and costly change orders down the road.
