That is a truly remarkable quote, “the difference between MF95 and MF04 is just an additional digit in the section number”! Are they referring only to Division 01?
Yes they are referring only to Div 1. You have to realize that we are dealing with people that may not be degreed or licensed and have probably never worked in industry. Their only experience is within the bureacracy. I truely believe that even in boom times they would never be given hiring consideration at an architect’s or engineer’s office.
Richard,
It is called “Rising to their level of incompetence.”
We all have encountered a few of these creatures in the past, many with lots of initials behind their name.
PA is probably just trying not to push anyone into the modern era against their will. Be thankful they allow electronic means of producing your work.
I am so happy we have have an FCSI with MAI credential as State Architect in Ohio.
When this came up, the additional services fee was the solution. And not just because it was a way to discourage this, but because there really was additional fee since our MF95 masters no longer existed.
If keynoting is included, it is pretty clear that the cost for this would be quite high. Also, it would almost certainly increase the odds of an error sneaking in, so you may want to (try to) get a waiver for errors occurring as a result of this change.
Well I don’t know what we have negotiated with the school but last I heard we will NOT go back to the 5 digit numbering system. I know that we have told the school district that we will help them convert.
I will keep you posted.
Sounds like 6 steps in the right direction.
We are just a couple days away from issuing a renovation project for a local City. Surprise, surprise, the “front end” and Division 1 sections arrived in my inbox and are based on Masterformat 1995. We were instructed to use these documents “as is.”
I’ve been asking for these documents for weeks.
Remainder of specifications sections were prepared using Masterformat 2004 section numbers.
Thanks for letting me vent.
This is why my dog & cat are allowed in my office, granted they constantly get into trouble and cause me aggravation, they are the best therapy, esp my dog, no matter how much I may vent at her, she still loves me unconditionally…and my cat, no matter how mean I am to her, she always wants my attention, loves being held and pet, great for stress reduction. Of course clients sometimes wonder why they hear a dog barking in the background, those who own dogs are very jealous and those that don’t I still tolerate.
Now getting to your problem, why not just issue the Front End as a separate Volume and than include the CSI Roadmap publication as a guide to translating 1995 version from 2004 - granted this is backward thinking, but it may reduce the confusion and aggravation of trying to get the City to change versions.
Good luck anyway undisclosed guest whom ever you are.
There is no way that we will convince the city to change their front end and Division 1 sections. They are thoroughly entrenched in their existing system and see no reason to update.
Thanks for the suggestion Jerome. This project is not large enough to issue separate volumes; containing only 19 technical specification sections.
Has anyone issued a project with both Masterformat 1995 and Masterformat 2004 documents / sections in one volume?
Note: I’ve revised all references to Division 1 sections contained in the technical sections to reflect use of Masterformat 1995.
Yes.
On a recent project the mechanical, plumbing, electrical consultant (east coast location) was retained by the Owner. Consultant is mired in MF95 and will not change for a variety of stuborn reasons. We adapted. In the master TOC, Divisions 22, 23 and 26 refer back to Divisions 15 and 16. Architectural sections simply refer to Division 15 and 16 in the TOC.
At the end of the day, is was not a problem.
On another project, different MEP, the mechancial contractor told the Owner he could not bid the project because Div 15 is missing. Pendulum swings both ways. Consultants on board with MF04/10 but trades lag behind stuck in MF95. Makes for some interesting days.
with the owner-provided documents, simply cover it in the table of contents. Simply put “Division 01” as the header and then “Provided by Owner”. And list them the way they are. when I cant budge consultants, I’ve done exactly as Wayne suggests – just reference things in the TOC, and people will figure it out. (and if they can’t, then it goes back to the owner anyway)
oh and Jerome – I used to have TWO basset hounds and lived (in an old neighborhood) next door to TWO chocolate labs. by next door, I mean “the house was 36” from my house and that space was the dog run". When I got drawing deliveries, all four of dogs started barking and it sounded like I was working in a dog kennel. sometimes I just had to call people back.
Anne, I have so many clients that have abandoned their offices and moved back to their homes that I hear the ocassional crying toddler during a conference call, its not an issue anymore. You do what you can to survive these days. The barking I can handle, but the cats walking on the keyboards and wierd text poping up well that gets old after a while. But than again therapy is expensive and sometimes petting the cat and venting on this forum will do just as well.
Well it looks like we lost the battle with our owner. Two of our principals and the project manager could not convince the school district to allow us to use MF 2004 (2010).
So does anyone know an easy way to convert our specs back to 1995?
this is not a major deal. mostly remove a “0”. But seriously - don’t you have the spreadsheet that came with the MF04 book?
also - for large institutions (think port of seattle) that have years of jobs and tons of paper with one system…is it REALLY that important to force them into another. there is a strong argument for leting them be. CSI was so long in developing a division of telecom - that they made their own.
as my daughter would say “just saying…”
David, Now that the specifications are done, it probably is a big deal. Here’s what I would suggest:
Ph.1: First and foremost, you should create a conversion list from MF04 to MF95 numbers. This is something you will refer to many times. Next, Add the MF95 numbers to the MF04 filenames, with a dash between. It will provide immediate recognition of the section from either vantage point.
Ph.2: Create an Autotext entry that changes each MF04 number to each MF95 number using your conversion chart. Then, when you select a MF04 number and press F3, the number will change to MF95 with no typing necessary. If possible, keep the MF04 titles. It should save some time editing the sections and header/footers where the name might appear.
Ph.3: Record a macro to search for the word “Section”. Call it “FindSearch”. At the end of the macro, when it finds the next “section”, have the macro move the cursor to the right about 5 spaces. If there is a MF04 number following the word section, it will end up in the middle of the section number. Quit the record function.
Ph.4: Create a Keyboard Shortcut to run the macro, and assign it to Alt-S, which should be available.
How it Works: Open each section, press Alt-S, then press F3 each time the cursor ends up in the middle of a MF04 number. In many cases the word “section” will not be followed by a number. However, you may have to manually open the header/footer and press F3 on the section number that appears there.
It may be laborious, the the easy part is that you don’t have to look up the corresponding MF95 number or do any typing. In theory, this should work, but I haven’t tried it. I do use Autotext to convert all my MF95 numbers to MF04, except the ones that just add a zero, and I do combine both MF section numbers in each filename.
Last time I had to convert from MF04 to MF95 I used the “Convert MasterFormat” feature in MasterSpec’s Multi-File dialog box. I just selected the files I wanted converted and clicked on the button. It did all the work in a couple of minutes; numbers, titles, and cross-references. I couldn’t believe how easy it was and how thorough. The only thing left to do was clean up the table of contents.