Design checking is a critical process in engineering that involves reviewing and validating designs and calculations to ensure they are accurate, error-free, and suitable for their intended purpose. The purpose of design checking is to enhance the quality and reliability of engineering designs, reduce errors and costs, and ensure compliance with relevant standards and regulations.
The design checking process typically involves the use of checklists, which are prepared for each important design process. These checklists aid in ensuring that all necessary factors and considerations have been accounted for in the design process. The design checklists may include items such as material selection, load and stress analysis, safety factors, dimensions, tolerances, and compliance with industry standards and regulations.
Design checking is a value-adding process that applies good engineering practices and aesthetics, which can lead to cost savings and provide better value to clients. It helps identify potential design errors and issues before fabrication or construction, which can save time and resources and prevent costly rework or redesign. By ensuring the quality of engineering designs, design checking also promotes safety and reliability in the final product.
Why design checking is required?
Design checking is an essential process in engineering to ensure that the design deliverables are of good quality, error-free, and in line with the appropriate design standards and codes. The purpose of design checking is to verify that the design meets the project requirements and specifications, to ensure that there is consistency in the design approach and aesthetics across units, and to optimize the design for cost and functionality. By performing design checking, potential errors can be identified and corrected before they result in costly field rework, delays, or safety issues. In summary, design checking is required to ensure the overall quality, safety, and cost-effectiveness of the design.
What do we check against?
During the design checking process, we check the design against various criteria to ensure that it meets the required standards and specifications. Some of the things we check against include:
- Applicable codes and standards: We check the design calculations against relevant codes and standards to ensure that they comply with the minimum safety requirements and industry best practices.
- Control documents: We check the design against various control documents such as P&IDs, Line List, General Arrangement Drawings, vendor drawings, design standards, checklists, etc. to ensure that they are consistent with each other and there are no discrepancies or omissions.
- Stress isometrics: Controlled issues of stress isometrics are checked to ensure that the design meets the required stress limits and there are no clashes or interference with other components in the system.
- Statutory norms and regulations: We check the design against various statutory norms and regulations such as OISD, IBR, etc. to ensure that it complies with the legal and regulatory requirements.
- Design safety, HSE, and constructability factors: We check the design for safety, health, and environmental factors to ensure that it meets the required safety standards and does not pose any hazards to personnel or the environment. We also check the design for constructability to ensure that it can be fabricated, installed, and commissioned as per the project schedule and budget.
Minimum Quality Plan for design Checking
To ensure a high-quality design checking process, it is recommended to follow a minimum quality plan that includes the following steps:
- Use appropriate color codes to track and identify the status of each design check.
- Use standardized checklists that cover all relevant design aspects. The checklists should be signed and dated after each review.
- Continuously review the design/model to ensure that any changes or updates are promptly addressed.
- Identify items that require special attention or independent review due to their complexity, criticality, or risk.
- Conduct design safety and constructability reviews to identify and address any potential hazards or issues.
- Require inter-squad checks on design documents prior to the final check and issue to ensure that all design aspects are thoroughly reviewed.
- Conduct formal stage-wise collaborative design review/model review sessions to involve all relevant stakeholders and ensure that the design meets the project requirements and objectives.
What do we check for?
During the design checking process, the following aspects are typically checked for:
- Accuracy and correctness of calculations and assumptions.
- Compliance with applicable codes and standards.
- Consistency with control documents, such as P&IDs, Line Lists, and General Arrangement Drawings.
- Optimization of the design in terms of cost and materials.
- Design safety, HSE, and constructability factors.
- Ease of fabrication, shipping, and erection.
- Reducing material and fabrication costs to improve value.
- Incorporating flexibility in the design, especially for critical items.
- Ensuring consistent design approaches for similar equipment and/or piping in the same unit area.
- Aesthetics, ensuring that the design looks good and meets client expectations.
Responsibility Matrix for design check
Design checking is a collaborative effort, and every individual involved in the process bears responsibility for ensuring an error-free and quality product. To facilitate this, the following responsibility matrix can be established:
- Each individual is responsible and accountable for checking their deliverables to ensure quality and an error-free design.
- Every individual should check, sign, date, and pass on the document to the next individual.
- Calculations/drawings received for checking by the next individual without a sign and date shall not be entertained/accepted.
- Back-ups of holds and assumptions, if any, should be maintained in an orderly manner before the issue.
- A signed and dated checklist, completely filled out, is a must for any checked document, as this serves as a quality record.
- The lead is ultimately responsible for the quality and correctness of the deliverables and enforces team conformance to quality procedures.
- Checking is a collaborative effort, and every individual owns and is accountable for an error-free and quality product.
Why Design Checking Adds Value
Design checking adds value in various ways, such as:
- Ensuring overall quality: By owning responsibility and following good practices and procedures, the design is error-free and of good quality.
- Preventing errors: The use of checklists ensures that important points are not missed out and design errors are avoided.
- Addressing interdisciplinary aspects: Design reviews and inter-squad checks ensure that all interdisciplinary aspects are considered in the design.
- Ensuring safety and constructability: Safety and constructability reviews ensure that the design is feasible, maintainable, operable, and safe.
- Incorporating fabrication/contractor-specific details: Incorporating such details into the design helps in easier and faster fabrication, resulting in fewer errors.
- Saving time and schedule: By facilitating a once-through approach from start to finish, design checking minimizes the need for rework, thereby saving time and schedule.
- Minimizing field rework: Design checking minimizes errors in the design, reducing the need for field rework.
Current State of Design Checking
- Lack of ownership and accountability by individuals
- Prioritization of project schedules and goals over quality
- Not working smartly and efficiently
- Using incomplete or superseded inputs for checking
- Poor capturing of design changes and revisions
- Failure to follow proper checking procedures, checklists, and colors from the initial stages
- Overlooking important items/spelling errors and focusing on irrelevant aspects
- Failure to clarify checking procedures, standards, guidelines, and checklists upfront
- Lack of early client approval on checking procedures and expectations
- Absence of a checking and approval matrix for deliverables
- Poor discipline holds summary maintenance
- Misalignment between the team and team leaders regarding project requirements/expectations
- Final number-crunching during the IFC issue period affecting productivity and efficiency, lowering team morale.
What Needs Improvement?
To improve the design checking process, a holistic approach should be adopted, clarifying the approach and expectations upfront through job notes and induction sessions. It is also necessary to obtain client approvals and finalize checklists upfront. Paying attention to minor details, including spell checks, is essential, and prioritizing and being focused is crucial to working smart. Checklists and proper procedures should be used religiously. It is mandatory to check against the latest documents to avoid rework and to start the final check process against a frozen and dated set of documents like P&IDs, LL, etc.
The lead should incorporate lessons learned in design into checklists as a process of procedural improvement and make expectations known to the team, fix individual responsibility, and enforce accountability. Assigning the right work to the right individual is also important. The team should be told that this is not an individual activity but a team effort. It is essential to sail or sink together.
Effective design checking is a critical aspect of achieving project success as it can translate into various benefits such as improved quality, reduced costs, and timely completion. It is important to understand that design checking is not a one-size-fits-all process, and a collaborative approach is required to find the best approach. It is necessary to challenge the existing situation and think innovatively to achieve positive outcomes. By embracing a proactive and out-of-the-box approach to design checking, teams can achieve optimal results and overcome challenges efficiently.