Technical-centered Project Engineer

All along I have been blaming I have no chance to gain technical knowledge by just working solely as a project engineer. Today, our spm had proved me wrong. He himself is a PE, by working as a Project Engineer ever since he graduated. Again I am impressed by his working attitude, professionalism, capability and ability as a Civil Engineer. Ultimately, all the moaning and groaning I have been having could only reflect how incapable am I.

Site management lesson 101: Apart from getting on track on how well or unwell is the contractor catching up on the site progress, I have to learn the subsequent activity from the on-going site work. For example, to connect the roof slab casting work to maxbond waterproofing membrane laying work. If any roof slab casting was delayed, the succeeding activity of laying waterproofing membrane by maxbond would be detained. This could create a waste outcome for on-holding work by maxbond. Another example is HuaTiong where the site work is dependent on heavy machinery, where the excavators are highly mobilized and will be removed from site if there is any idling work. Hence, I have to try to link all activities to make sure all work sequences could flow smoothly.

In addition, though it is contractually inappropriate, I have to engage the contractor on who will be holding the ball on certain activity. For instance, HT will be responsible on breaking the LSS and spoils, following the ball would be at WH hands to trim the pipes and rebars at the Dwall. I got to have all the information in hand, and to make sure every sub contractor knows what is their responsibility, and know at which stage they would have to commit the work at full capacity.

Civil Engineering knowledge 101: The design of double strutting is due to the effective length from the second moment of Area, in which is the distance between two struts. This however will have a breakeven point where there is a maximum capacity of the buckling load of a strut. Also, the double waler beam design is now a common practice. A stiffener is usually installed at the waler beam which is align to the web of the strut to have an effective load transfer. In this case, the both stiffeners at the waler beams have to be in a line.

To monitor the compressive strength of a strut is holding, we will be using Strain Gauge (SG) and Load Cell (LC), SG has 4 sensors, one sensor as each web of the strut; which LC is placed in between flanges of two struts. Usually, LC could only be installed when there is a support of runner beam holding the struts. Both instruments are used for verification of the compression readings, counter checking the precise reading for calibration. SG is usually be installed at 1/3 of the span of a strut as mid-span would usually encountering the maximum bending moment, and hence gives the maximum readings; and not too close to the support due to the load would be distributed to the load spreaders of the strut, consequently the reading would not be accurate.

So far for today.

A rough yet splendid day in LTA ?

As usual, first thing to do in the office every morning - to clear emails and to set up a draft work plan for the day. Fortunately enough, the morning was going smoothly according to plan, and followed up a rough afternoon where a few things just bumped into me in one go!

First of all, to attend the Design Meeting with full involvement, I had followed up my own part in all the design submissions and replies. However, I still missed out the issuance of C&S drawings from our Accredited Engineer (AE - ARUP) to WH. Lesson 1 learnt - always follow up any design drawings issued from Design team/AE with Carina, and to check on the date that project team issued to WH. In this case, WH had received it yet refuse to acknowledge the acceptance of the documents due to LTA had failed to produce an official transmittal. Personally think that WH could just raise this issue up in the meeting instead of blaming LTA has not issued to them AT ALL. Anyway, experience gained from this episode is to always check and follow up with the issuance of any drawings to our contractor.

Luckily, I managed to sort out the issue accordingly. From replying Ting Yong regarding the trial trench status of T205, attending the progress update to planner Ting Hee, arrange out our own site progress to be brief in the PD meeting tomorrow morning, follow up the drawings checklist to Ms Tam in WH, and finally to go on site to have more site knowledge for my own benefit! To add brilliance to my splendor afternoon, Tritech Wee Keat shared some important conversations between him and the irksome pd from contractor to me, and that gives me a better picture of the real feud and problem of the issues all along - Stage 2 Traffic Diversion and Entrance D traffic decking issues. I would not comment what will I gain from knowing this kinda issue, but I am honored to gain the trust from a principal engineer, and being acknowledged that I am actually working towards progress instead of creating unnecessary and diverted issues. I am delighted.

And, I will have to attend the PD meeting tomorrow, on behalf of our PM as the representative of T205 project team. I have done what I should have done, and hopefully everything will go smoothly tomorrow!

Across the Strait

A very short weekend trip to Johor Bahru, to visit Traditional Chinese Medic (TCM) and visiting a friend in the same time. Mr py is indeed a real friend who doesn't haggle much on anything, willing to be our driver picking us up, sending us to everywhere and not to mention accommodating us. So, we had a great seafood feast on my courtesy, followed by a chill drinking session and chit chatting at his place.

As for Sunday, we went on to satisfy my Bah Kut Teh crave, visit doctor, a relaxing Thai massage and ending the trip with a cup of coffee. A little shopping was done later on at City Square, and finalized with a dinner.

The main subject of this passage is as mentioned, "the cultural difference across the strait." At Msia side, everything is in relatively slow progress, even the speed of escalator is could be described as the speed of snail,  and it is not exaggerating at all. Not to mention on the effectiveness of immigration officer, which I believe is a well-known fact that has not been improved since ages ago. Hence we waited patiently to cross the immigration, crossing the border to the SG side, where everything is processed in a reasonable speed, with respects of escalator speed and effectiveness of immigration officer.  What's more, the arrangement of bus berth, and traffic conditions utterly showing the difference between a developed and developing nation.

More to go, my beloved motherland.

Micro Managing

A monthly PGI was conducted this morning for our project T205 by SPM. Half an hour on site safety and environmental issue, and spent one and half hour pushing the progress of the project. And in this stage, both the engineers, me and Laurence had split the station into two major bits, and in-charge of respective area in terms of progression and site issues. 

So from now on, I will need to coordinate closely with the contractor site engineers to keep track on the progress. Starting from understanding the planned and forecast work, then micro manage their daily progress by ensuring their target of the day followed by reviewing the work progress by asking what is holding the work back and failed to achieve the daily target. In this context, I will need to work closely with Chen Kai, Edwin, Subbiah the site engineers to make sure the target is always achieved. Meanwhile, by closely monitoring the micro progress, I can learn more about site issues, coordination between sub-contractors and further improve the scheduling and planning of work with considering the site access and working space constraint. More to learn !

As for the admin conflict issue, I learn that we should not interfere the admin work with our wish. Anyway to respect each other, we need to engage the related person, sit down and discuss a solution where both of the parties could work together. I have to admit one lesson learnt from this episode - never interrupt and change someone's system with my own regards. Somehow I will need to engage the person before touching their things. Therefore, in my position, I will undo all the renaming of the files back to Carina's standard, then talk to German regarding the SPM solution in solving the conflict. Lastly, send out a comforting email to get back the harmony of the office. =D

Project Progress Push

The project engineer was assigned a new task -  to conduct a weekly site walk with contractor site engineer to go through with the week's progress, obstruction faced and to discuss any obstacles that were holding back the project progression. This might sound a little pushy, yet I think it is a good way for me to learn more about on-site issues and technical stuff, not to mention the learning about what could be improved in terms of progression, work force arrangement or the entire project planning schedule.

So, I have set a target for myself - to conduct site walk at least twice a week. First one during one of the days on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday, another one on Thursday together with PGI. Hopefully within these days, I could somehow catch up the practical issues on site. As for the rest days of the week, I have to improve myself in managing a project. In this context, the office or the paper works. There are many things to learn on how to control and keeping trace on the project progression from the office, and in the same time to push the contractor on doing work according to their plan, and even sometimes to improve their planning. Somehow I am still lack of experience on that, so the best guru I can shadowed is German and Hooi Leng. Learning the skills from them to be forceful to the contractor and not being over-controlled back by them. 

Also, I had learned a new thing from my colleague Laurence, on taking note of the drawings to answer to the project bosses. Mr Heng requested to paste the roof slab concrete pouring plan, while I have no idea where to get it, Laurence pointed it out in no time and we did it successfully. One thing I should keep in mind - always be vigilant on all documents and submissions from contractor, as those were the important information we need. 

Next thing to learn: Purpose, methodology and rectifying method for Sonic Coring Test, RQD and TCR. 

Improvement in work

Today marks the two and half months of my very first official job, working as a project engineer for LTA in neighbor country, Singapore. And to record down all the findings and experiences throughout the job, I hereby reopen the blog, hopefully by more writings I could improve my English to the required standard in work.

Starting by noting down the incident happened today, 21 July 2015. It was a fine morning whereas all the jobs assigned to me have already done, not to perfect standard but it is still in progress of sharpening it. Until the IM meeting, I realized there are so many information I should have noted down and report to every related engineers or managers, For example, the instrumentation to be installed at Entrance D and upcoming sheet piling works at station box, should the readings be revised by QPD to address the potential similar issue that happened for inclinometer installed in GL 8. So, lesson learnt: not neglecting every single information, regardless of its severity. Keep everything in mind, or note them down.

Lesson two: always be vigilant for and in every meetings. Preparation works have to be done always, for instance going through the minutes, in this stage I will be more exposed to different writing and reporting method in the same time, and to aware of what I should be answerable to in the meeting. Also, note down all essential information and share to the bosses. 

Lesson three: more technical knowledge are required. I went to the site this evening right after completing the office and paper works, to grab the opportunity to have more site knowledge. Moreover, it was the final bored pile casting for this project, with 29.9m depth and expected of 20m3 of concrete for casting. Concrete in used was G40, with slump test result of 50mm. Bored pile casting needs a higher workability concrete, which means higher slump test gives more wetness and flow-able in the tremie pipe. Also, good to learn that one concrete truck carries maximum of 9m3 concrete.

Next thing to learn, sheet piling and related instrumentation, strutting and related instrumentation, excavation, slope design for access. Minor works to learn is fissure grouting. BEAR IN MIND.

Vocabulary: nosh, elucidate, analogous (matching, comparable), dub, dispute, dire (poor quality), sanguine (positive)

Alright, hopefully the self esteem is recovered for a bit. goodnight =D

Memories

As time flies, good memories are good to be mesmerized. The good times and pleasant that gone through will always be embedded vividly, and to be cherished for the rest of the life =D