guide lines on tendering for industrial design

huangyhg

guide lines on tendering for industrial design.
hallo,
i need help on tendering for the design of a industrial building. i am from sa and not 100% familiar with the estimated guess method used as guide line to tender in the uk.
will it be reasonable to estimate the professional fee at 1.5% of construction value? (super and sub structure design)
..or will it be best just to estimate potential time spend on design and then charge a hourly rate on that?
thanks in advance for the support.
i assume that you are talking about the structural design only.  it is usually wise to figure the cost both ways.  when you go through the exercise of figuring out the hours you expect to spend, you have a much better "feel" for the job requirements.  the design costs also are quite dependant on the size of the project.  it is supprising how much time a small job can eat up!
thanks jheidt2543 for the response to my querie.
i am still a bit in the dark as to how much i should tender for the following project. please help me on how much i should tender if the folowing information is available.
tender on structural works:
2 x warehouse industrial storagebuilding on 1 site.
steel portal frame for both - max height 10m .
area 1 - 1680 mm^2 (35 x 48).
area 2 - 1695 mm^2 (32 x 53).
grid of pile and ground beams (say 5 x 6m).
internal columns to brake up span.
steel sheeting as cladding.
cost allowed for structural works - £1,200,00-00.
thanks for the advise in advance.

since you are considering the work involved in only the structural engineering, what i would suggest is to prepare an outline of the work required and assign to each item the number of manhours you think it will take. the list should include:
pre-design meetings with client
building code review
load developement & design calculations
foundation plan & details
framing plan & details
specifications
shop drawing review
job site visits during construction (at a minimum 3, one at foudation excavation, one at foundation installation and one at framing erection)
then total the number of hours and multiply by your hourly rate.  you should also include the costs for printing, sub-consultants if any, equipment, travel, etc.
this estimate is "usually" somewhere in the range of 0.75% to 1.25% of the cost of construction.  it does depend a lot on the complexity of the project.