Construction/Estimating Web Sites
(Please report any broken links HERE.)
www.contractorswarehouse.com/estimates.html
This
company was real specific on their web page. The web page advertised a lot of
options of framing a house; they estimate framing, floor truss, materials,
lumber, roofing, insulation, siding, and interior work. This company also bids
pole barns; they would give you an estimate on treated poles, roof trusses,
steel roofs, steel siding, windows and overhead doors. This web site had
different links to products, price list and how to and what to consider before
you even do an estimate.
http://www.andyshowto.com/building_cost.htm
This
web page has a sample estimate on their main web page. The estimate is broken
down to labor material per square feet. The list starts from preparation,
excavating, foundation, framing, sheeting, roofing, windows, and doors, inside
work such as floor, insulation, and HVAC drywall to general contractors profit.
This web page gives you a guide for preparing plans what to consider before
going with a project. This helps people to compare their dream verses cost to
fit their needs; also being realistic. This web site is user friendly.
www.advancedbid.com/html/program_overview.html
This
web site is advertising new software called the AdvancedBid 2000 program. They
claim that this software is the easiest most sophisticated user friendly. This
program would be good for an inexperienced estimator.
This
program has redesigned Administrative forms, address book, note pad. This
program also has job overhead such as clean-up travel cost, job trailer,
permits and fees. This web site shows sample sheet of each data sheet, like the
summary sheet, construction categories, major subcontractors, vendors, and the
last minute price adjustment. The labor rates buttons on the pricing column and
materials are combined.
www.durashield.com/products/2300/
This
web site talks about the new chemical that they put on the vinyl fiberglass
siding. This product material is to
product from ultraviolet rays (which takes color out and make it look dull and
chalky), Acid rain, and dirt that get trapped in it. With this product it restore original beauty and waterproofs it.
www.everlastroofing.com/?source=goto
Everlast
II is very successful with its unique way. Their secret is that it has a
special hot for process. It is very
popular and successful. This steel is
also a galvanized heavier than others.
This is excellent steel for commercial, residential, agricultural,
architectural, and industrial buildings.
Everlast uses harder paints so that it won't
crack as easy.
http://homeadvisor.msn.com/improve/roofing.asp
Roofs
vary in there covering materials and design, but most roofs consist of wood
framing wood sheathing, roofing felt, flashing, and the surface roofing
materials. Roofs are sheath with
plywood or panels or for wood singles or spaced boards. Roofing felt lies between the sheathing and
the finished material.
http://www.everlastroofing.com/?source=goto
This
site is dedicated to sales of steel roofing and siding. Everlast roofing Inc.
has links to samples of their products, a Q&A section, even links to
contractors that may be able to set up a construction schedule.
http://www.cadcam.solutionsaustralia.com.au/Beams/estimatecad.htm
This is
an Australian based site that offers CAD/CAM Estimator software. Plugging into
existing CAD software they claim that estimating costs has never been easier.
They offer a free demonstration of their estimator CAD software.
http://www.fostersupply.com/estimation.asp
This
site offer to do the estimating services for you! They specialize in quantity
estimation and also do rebar detailing, provide you with produced bar lists,
placement lists, and rebar tags.
This
site is a good place to go if you wanted to Purchase, Walker’s Building
Estimator’s Reference Book Which sounds like a handy book to have around. A
cording to the web site this book has been considered the “bible” of estimating
for the past 85 years.
http://www.builders-software.com/
At this
site I found estimating software and accounting software for sale. The site
also provides a slide show of the estimating software with brief description on
how it works. It sounds like it is more for company use not for personal.
http://www.estimating.org/categories.cfm
This
site offers seminars on construction estimating and online training that might
be interesting. None of these seminars are local but the online does make it
somewhat useful.
Busby
& Associates Inc. is a company that specializes in cost estimating. They have a large range of services
including: Construction budgets, appraisal of sites, cost analysis, and
computer application for construction.
They have a wide range of experienced staff that contains quantity
surveyors, architects, estimators, and data processors. They also had this really cool graphic too.
http://www.unisa.edu.au/gpb/building/careerinforamtion/index.html
This
web page is a part of the University of South Australia – School of
Geoinformatics, Planning and Building, and is all about careers in quantity
surveying/estimating. It contains links
to information on jobs in the fields of urban and regional planning/transport
planning, construction/project management, and surveying/GIS.
http://www.buildsoft.com.au/products_index.html
Buildsoft
produces computer-estimating software.
These programs range from large commercial use to homebuilders,
subcontractors, and suppliers, to palm pilot estimating programs to linear
scaling programs. The site also
compares and contrasts the products it offers.
At this
website the International Construction Material is offering many types of
concrete and concrete tools. The first
type of concrete is conloc fibers.
Conloc controls plastic shrinkage crack and has less maintenance then
any other types of concrete. The second
type of concrete is the Fritz-Pak Admixtures.
They offer the Prime-A-Pac or Slick Willie Pump Primer. Sika is another additive to concrete that
has corrosion inhibitors for reinforced concrete.
http://www.materialtakeoffs.com/
The
second website I visited was the material take offs. At this website a person can send in a list of items they want to
bid on and the professionals at this website will look and analyze the job and
send you a quote and a CES Express List which is a list of materials needed for
the building. They bid on jobs ranging
from hotels to residential to restaurants.
http://www.constructionguy.com/estimating.htm
At the
last website I visited, Construction Experts Inc, they provided detailed
quantity take-off and preliminary pricing for building construction
projects. They assist contractors and
owners in the bidding or budgeting phases of their projects.
NWBuilders
Network a web site is a guide to references for construction and home
improvement resources. It has
everything from companies in the northwest, to books, and software materials
for construction. It shows to start
house plans and get the permits to do so.
Civil
Engineering a better world by design this web site has headlines about
construction and materials, or businesses in the construction field. It also
shows upcoming events based on this field.
It has a large section of reference books about design and materials,
along with a section of links to other sites.
This
web site shows useful tools for estimating the cost of some construction. It has a large section on new and
alternative insulation materials and products.
It also
focuses on books and videos on how to do home projects yourself.
http://www.MaterialEstimating.com
Nicely
designed website where you send in blue prints and they give you a takeoff for
lumber and building materials. They provide lists with total quantities for
easy calculations and prices. Generally
takes to do a house project is 3-5 days, 7-10s for any larger projects Average cost is 150$.
http://www.Northamericaintl.com
North
American International
This
company specializes in metal building, designs, supplies, and materials. They
work with commercial, institutional, residential and warehouse projects. They
provide interior finish products, materials and Doors and windows. They also
provide help with all projects from start to finish.
General
materials, tools website. Discusses new materials and tools in the construction
trade. Also goes over equipment used in construction.
Also
have a quick links section with classifieds with jobs and equipment for sale,
and a message board. Also provides a career center with more detailed job
descriptions.
This is
a site where you can purchase estimating software. You can also download some update files from the site. The software is called FastCost and was
developed by Simon Pty Ltd, which is located in Toowoomba, Australia.
www.usace.army.mil/inet/usace-docs/eng-regs/er1110-2-1302/a-d.pdf
This
site has several pages that you can read about procedures for preparation of
cost estimates. This is the US Army
Corps of Engineers site.
This
site is an online bookstore where you can buy a book about estimating
excavation. The site allows you to
review a chapter in the book as well as the table of contents before deciding
to buy the book.
Metal
Truss, L.L.C. offers contractors and builders the convenience, quality, and
cost savings of plant fabricated pre-engineered trusses, complete with sealed
shop and layout drawings.
http://www.webnow.com/pinetrader
Online
source for finding the lumber you need. Service provided by Tony Lipsey.
http://www.thomasregional.com/newtrd/index.html?us=AA:3b9cd822b5d7a
Your
marketplace is for industrial buying.
Suppliers of many products used nationally. "Gives you free access to a searchable database of more than
550,000 distributors, manufacturers, and service companies in all key US
industrial markets."
Site
relates to the Blue Book of Building and Construction. It lets you search a database to find
construction information in different regions and companies. There are tons of accessible information to
building materials and where to find various products.
The
third site that I came to was buildingsite.com. Unless you were a construction worker of interested in
construction this would probably not the place you would really want to go
to. This site had different articles on
construction. So if you were in
construction you would probably be more interesting than to someone who is not. My first web site is on out of Beirut,
Lebanon. Construction Material LTD is
the name of this company. They have
waterproofing and construction chemicals as well a tile laying, flooring, and
interior materials for the construction of any building.
The
third web site that I looked into was one on construction materials. They have different divisions. Each division
looks at one thing like division 1 is general data and division 6 talks about
wood and plastics. There are 17
divisions and you may enter the division and get info on what the division is
about.
The
Directory Exchange for all Manufacturers of Construction Materials, Supplies
and Services. Likes to CSI Divisions
www.architecturalstone.net/frame.html
This
site contains several ideas about stonework for architectural and commercial
applications. It offers a variety of stone works for decoration and useful
applications. These applications include but are not limited to fireplaces,
stone flooring, and exterior stone works. It offers all these stone works in a
variety of stone types.
This
site deals in cabinetry for homebuilders. The site offers ideas to builders on
kitchen planning and cabinet designs. It has a cabinet buying guide, cabinet
construction methods, and construction details among other things. It also has
a variety of wood types used in these cabinets.
This
site offers decorative doors for architecture. The doors offered are made of
metal and add flair to any home. It also offers different styles of estate
entry gates as well. Another variety of entry doors they offer is pedestrian
entry doors.
Micro
Estimating Systems was started in 1985, developing and marketing high precision
business technology. They say they are the industry leader in computer-aided
process planning and estimating systems. Micro engineers software for the
machining and fabrication industries with extremely precise manufacturing times
and costs. The company designs and markets software products and provides
training, maintenance and support services. This will run on Windows 2000 or
any Windows local area network. The
also sell books and other Micro. Stuff.
Estimationsystems
sells books to help with the estimating process. As with all the web sites, if
you want to buy something, you can probably find it on this site, but if you
are looking for information on estimating, it will cost you.
Like
all the others, HCSS has there own software for sale. They say they offer a
free version of the software, but I could not get it to download. But they did
have a nice slide show to demonstrate their software and how it would work the
best for me. They also sold a lot of other thing like books, and services.
http://www.ivillage.com/home/doit/
iVillage
Home& Garden Channel Do-it-yourself Department Initially this sounded like
a promising site. However, I found that
there was not as much that really would help someone in cost estimating. The "Wallpaper Calculator" feature
was no longer available. I realize that
planning is an important step in any remodeling or construction project. However, much that was listed in the
"Remodel Your Kitchen On A Budget" was more about determining what
your personal style was than actual money amounts. When I searched the site for cost estimating, the results were
disappointing. Most of what was listed
was irrelevant unless you were planning to remodel using pricey antiques. Probably the most helpful information was in
the link to the United States Fire Safety Association. Even that provided very little in terms of
actual costs. Overall, I felt this site
was more of a decorating and advertising site than a construction and
estimating site.
Deccan
Systems Incorporated site seems to be focused primarily on the businessperson
that is currently doing all of own estimating manually. It advertises software that can perform cost
estimating for a wide variety of construction and manufacturing situations,
i.e., plastics molding, metalworking, construction, and software
development. The three main sections
were Benefits of Using DeccaPro, Is This Your Typical Day and What You Can Do With
DeccaPro. According to them, this software
is quick, accurate, results in more bid awards, less risk, more sales, saves
time and money and lowers costs. Not
only that, "anyone can do it".
Excellent presentation. If this
site and software can provide everything that they say they can, it made me
wonder why we are learning to do this any other way!!
The
Samson Homes Company is a company based upon the sales of pre-fab homes. Which
means a home that is put together in a warehouse and then sold to a contractor
or contractors. It is then the duty of the contractor to ship and assemble the
pre-fab home to the job-site or property of the client. These homes are fairly
inexpensive but are also fairly generic. With the pre-fab home comes
simplicity.
BT
Building Systems manufactures pre-fab wall panels. The system that BT is using
is a mix of CAD and CAM, computer aided manufacturing. The process can
manufacture six three-story homes in a single eight-hour shift. This being only
the structural framing and not including siding or flooring or any other
details of the home. They then number the wall panels and inform the contractor
the order of the construction.
QB
Corporation is involved in the making of glue-lam beams. Basically this is a
process of taking waste wood products and mixing them with a type of glue and
compressing them into the form of beams with extreme pressure. This site also
provides structural charts to let the contractor determine the type and size of
the beam needed for his application. For example, the span for a particular
beam before it will give to pressure. The contractor definitely wouldn't want
to get a call from his client saying he fell through his kitchen floor because
the contractor used too weak of a glue-lam beam. Not good!!!
http://www.contech-cpi.com/html/indexb.htm
This
website sales construction material and products. Contech is a construction product incorporation that produces
material to sell. At their website they
sell and produce corrugated steel, aluminum and plastic pipes, metal plate
structures, segmental concrete walls, pedestrian and two-lane bridges. They also sell and produce geosynthetic
products for the highway, drainage, sewage, site-improvement markets, and they
do have innovative applications for detention systems, storm drainage, sewage
lines, bridges, tunnels, and retaining walls.
The website has features which allow you to find what a product can be
used for or what products they have available for your application. The website basically is an informational
tool which has a list of sales offices and their location with phone number and
fax.
http://www.constructionguy.com
This
web address is a site about Construction Experts Incorporation. They provide house formation training programs,
seminars for supervisors, construction planning and scheduling, cost
estimating, and project management.
They offer general quantity take-off and preliminary pricing for
building projects, structural and architectural concrete estimating, conceptual
estimating, and bidding assistance. They also offer an online course
Introduction To Construction Estimating.
This is an informational based website with various ways to contact them
for further incite.
GAF
Materials Corporation offers a wide range of residential and commercial roofing
materials. They meet design needs for
standard 3-tab shingles, architectural shingles, conventional built-up roofs,
modified bitumen systems, and composite systems. They have 26 plants throughout the United States. They also have
roofing products such as flashings and vents, insulation, membranes and felts,
cements, coatings, adhesives and asphalt.
In addition they have training videos.
This website is informational only with ways to contact them for further
information.
The company is Vertigraph Incorporated. They supply Construction Company’s software
that computerizes their bidding, estimating, and digitizing. Vertigraph has a wide range of customers
they supply, such as contractors, subcontractors, industrial, residential, and
road crew construction. Examples of
their software include, BidWorx (a program that keeps track of materials, equipment,
and other items you wish to detail) BidPoint XL (basically an advanced
estimating software based off of Excel).
Vertigraph also offers training classes, consulting services, and needs
assessments for contractors.
They
supply contractors, estimators, engineers, and designers with software and
services throughout the world. They
supply a staff of technical workers that are there to provide contractors with
effective solutions to any cost estimating and analysis situation. The technicians also supply information
about Value Engineering, Risk Analysis, Systematic Design, Partnering
Solutions, and Project Scheduling. U.S.
Cost developed their own software called Success and software tools that connect
estimating to scheduling, external cost databases, and quantity takeoff.
It turned out to be a Construction Estimating
Institute. It is a non-profit
organization that increases estimating and management skills of those who
attend the courses. They offer staff
training, contractors licenses for certain states, on-line education,
estimating software, employment, and even on-site training. This was amazing to me finding an
institution that teaches you on the job while your doing it. They also address training needs on a
nationwide level.
This website opens to several folders from wood and concrete to furnishings and electrical. Any of these can be opened and explored further, focusing on the numerous details of these general construction concepts. Also included on this website are various posted construction trade and architectural/engineering jobs. Like the other websites, the latest new in this industry is also available.
http://www.accurateestimating.com/
This site, is for a business based in Phoenix, Arizona, was mainly set up for remodeling of homes. They do the estimating, and the financing needed to
remodel. They also draw and redraw blueprint for homes. One feature that stuck out was
there links to local contractors.
http://www.northest.com/index.htm
This site tells you where to send a set of drawings to have an estimate done. They review your drawing, then call you so that you can
have changes done depending on cost or any thing else that you would like to
have done. They are able to have your estimate and drawings sent back to you with in
seven working days.
http://www.walshestimating.com/
This company specializes in division 2 and 3 site work and structural concrete, quantity surveys,
earthwork takeoffs, environmental redemption, marine and heavy highway projects,
Construction claims and value engineering.
