structural draftsman

huangyhg

structural draftsman
it sure is hard to find good structural draftspeople. i know that the steel detailing industry is going through a semi-crises with maintaining qualified detailers and wonder if drafting as a whole is becoming scarce. anybody have any good tips on finding qualified structural draftsmen?
whenever i have a hard time finding a draftsman. i do the drafting, in addition to the design, myself. i have found that it decreases drafting errors considerably.
there are good draftspeople out there! the problem is keeping them busy. a good draftsperson, working with autocad or microstation, can keep two or three engineers busy. all that is needed is plenty of work. keep looking!
i am not familiar with microstation. but, i found it the opposite with autocad. i was able to keep 2-3 good draftsmen busy at the same time. the trick was to have them do work for you, so as to help you cut time you spend. such as preparing details, where you only modify that detail as per your design instead of preparing that detail from a to z.
after all the engineer's hourly rate is much higher than the draftsman's.
some community colleges have drafting courses. also, there are some small private schools, such as hamilton college that train draftsmen. doing it yourself might cut down on errors but you can't make any money and you should be out looking for work instead.
faf, yes you have a point there. but nevertheless, i believe that an engineer should be proficient in drafting. that saves time and reduces errors.
i disagree that it reduces errors. as a professional engineer my time is best spent in research, creating and developing designs and problem solving. i would prove to be an extremely expensive draughtsman if i spent time on the cad terminal playing around with drawings. i feel that engineers should be thoroughly grounded in draughtsmanship whilst at university. this gives them an appreciation of the cad operator's requirements from the engineer for drawing production. cad operators spend all day drawing and are therefore quicker, more accurate, more adaptable, know more cad shortcuts, have time to organise standard details etc etc than does an engineer with part time experience. if we take our eye off the ball and start messing with drawings rather than forwarding the profession in terms of creative thought then we will end up being further devalued and being ousted from another area of engineering (as we have been removed from engineering financial management by qs's). here endeth my soap box lecture !!
ginger
well said ginger. i'm a very old structural engineer that drew my own designs 45 yrs. ago and also did steel and reinforcing detailing along with design and drafting and doing long hand calculations and using a slide rule....(ever used one?) but those days are gone forever with the advent of the computer and cad. engineers that do their own drafting might do that when first starting out but the first thing to do after you nail down your first or second clients is get a cad operator and go out and sell more work. you can still check your draftman's work as you would your own.
it seems, i am waging a loosing argument here. i am neither a newly graduate employee, nor am i an employer and nor do i have 45 years of experience. i am at the middle of the road, i.e. 15-20 years experience.
probably, what i said earlier, is not suitable for an employee in a firm, where it is not financially acceptable for the engineer to do the work of a draftsman who is paid less.
it may not be also suitable for an owner of a small consultancy, who has to divide his time between doing and checking designs and getting new jobs.
what i said earlier is suitable for me because i am a free-lancer. my clients are a couple of architectural firms. it is their responsibility to go out and get new jobs. new clients for me mean employing not just draftsmen but engineers as well, in other words opening an office.
maybe, my opinion is applicable more to the area i operate in which are the gulf states. not the uk or usa.
thanks for all the entertainment but can any body help with my initial question? where do you find trained structural draftsmen whithout stealing them from other firms?
by the way, hasanh, if your doing your own drafting, your loosing money.
you want the best draftsman money can buy without stealing from another firm. as a civil draftsman i can tell you.you will not find good people directly out of school. you want people with good work habits and 5-10 years experince. it is real easy, start paying couple dollar more a hour than anybody in town and they will find you.if they cannot cut the mustard, replace that quick. you will end up with the best. the people that are good know they are good and will follow the money. why should i leave my job here to work for less with you. pay the money, vacation, medical and they will come. you have to market your company has the best in town to work for. a person that gets paid five dollar a hour is going to do five dollar a hour worth of work. you get what you pay for