Bidding on a new church

[rick5280]

Got an interesting request for a bid on a new church building. Has the normal pulpit/alter area, with pews and cathredal ceiling, and a few offices. It will also have a few (4) small classrooms, a kitchen and a dining area, as well as the necessary bathrooms.
How would one go about bidding on this job? Would you who do this normally bid it at a square foot price, or another way?

I am sure that it would have to be pipe/a/c cable, and would expect it to have fluorescent wrap-a-rounds in all rooms except the cathredal proper. What type of lighting would one put in this area? Floods, recessed cans, indirect fluorescent?

It will also have a walk-in babtismal pit, full of heated water. Anyone have experience with wiring for this? I am leaning towards the hot-tub type of setup, without the jets.

Thanks in advance for any info provided.

 

[Guest]

Re: Bidding on a new church

First off you need a good set of electrical drawings to show you the location of all the outlets, panels, etc. and specifying which fixtures & finish to use.

Make a list of all materials you will need to complete the job. Send it out to a couple of supply houses for material bids.

Add on a reasonable contingency for overruns.

Estimate your labor.

Add on all the permits, fees, etc.

Tack on your overhead & profit.

Use a square foot price as a rule-of-thumb cross-check to make sure you are not way under, but the cost breakdown will tell you the right price if you do it carefully.

Finally, spell out how change orders (adds & subtracts) will be dealt with. Change Orders will make or break this job depending on how careful you are to add/subtract appropriately.

Unless you do churches day in and day out, and unless they are all very similar a per-foot price will trick you more than treat you.

 

[rick5280]

Re: Bidding on a new church

Wayne, thanks for the reply. However, there is no electrical on the blueprints, customer wants us to design it. I guess the same process could be used, only with us putting electrical onto print, and having supply house cost it out.

What figure would you use as a check (using the cost per sq. ft method)?

 

[racraft]

Re: Bidding on a new church

Regarding the baptismal font, make sure you understand what they want.

Often a baptismal font is nothing more than a large bathtub, to be filled with warm water, used and then drained. You may need nothing more than lighting at the font itself. They may want a separate water heater or instant hot water device at the font, or they will want to use the hot water for the rest of the building. (The baptismal font is usually filled early in the morning on Sundays, when there is no other demand on the system.)

However, they may also want something along the lines of what you are thinking, an enclosure that can remain filled with water, filtered and heated as necessary.

In my own church, our Baptismal font is used once or twice a year, and has nothing more than a hot and cold faucet and a drain.

[ September 22, 2003, 09:27 AM: Message edited by: racraft ]

 

[rrrusty]

Re: Bidding on a new church

Ask about a sound system; If that would be done by you or others, some churches have quite the video/sound/electronics system; they may need power for that.

 

[Guest]

Re: Bidding on a new church

If they call it a bathtub and there is no electrical you have the easiest time.

The next step up would be to call it a Hydromassage Tub. This category is not as stringent as Swimming Pools & much less stringent than Hot Tubs or Spas.

For a bathtub see the UPC.

For Hydromassage see mostly:
680.71, 680.73, 680.74, 430.102(B).

../Wayne C.

[ September 22, 2003, 11:51 PM: Message edited by: awwt ]

 

[goldstar]

Re: Bidding on a new church

However, there is no electrical on the blueprints, customer wants us to design it.

Rick,

I'm not familiar with the rules and regulations in Colorado but here in NJ they don't allow electrical contractors to design commercial electrical systems and layouts. It has to be done by an electrical engineer.

I can tell you, from my own experience while on my church parish council and involvement with the church expansion project, that they don't have a lot of $$$ to spend and they look to cut corners any way they can. In this case it looks to me like they've bypassed the electrical design in order to save $$$. Also, unless they've received some big windfall from a wealthy parishioner they basically look to the parishioners for donations and/or committments in the way of pledges. So, if you do manage to land this job after all the advice you get, make sure you know how you're going to get paid.

To give you some idea of what you should expect in the way of electrical work I'll describe what our current church foot print is and the electrical work in it. We have 2 structures on our property, the church proper and a community center. The sq. ft area of the church is approx 8-10 K sq. ft and about the same for the community center. The community center has a commercial kitchen, central air, ballroom area, classrooms and office area. The church has an altar, pulpit, sacristy area, choir area, entry narthex and central air. We currently have a 1200 amp service with the transformer sitting on a pad behind the church as well as some rather large switchgear as well. There are (3) 3-phase, 40 circuit, 120/208 sub panels in both the church and community center. All wiring is in conduit.

The church has a vaulted ceiling with recessed lights. Lighting in the narthex areas are also recessed. Lighting for the altar area has approx (18) PAR recessed flood lights shining up onto the mosaics on the ceiling and back drop. There is a sound system with numerous speakers, tape deck and wireless microphones. We alo have closed circuit TV, parking lot lighting, memorial garden lighting and we have a festival each year that requires about an additional 150 amps of temporary service for lighting and power in outdoor tent areas.

I've imparted this information to you because it didn't seem, at least from the jist of your post, that you were a "design and build" type company.

IMHO the liability for this project is greater than what the job is worth.

Regards,

Phil

[ September 24, 2003, 05:33 AM: Message edited by: goldstar ]

 

[jim sutton]

Re: Bidding on a new church

I've done a few churches myself, they can be good jobs, but without a print you can get into a lot of trouble. Change orders can kill you. Make sure that everything is in writing, down to the last receptacle and switch. With churches, you have to deal with the whole building committee or just about every other member that thinks he knows about construction. They will come in when you are about done and say something like " hey, why didn't you put a light here". Do not imply anything that you are not willing to back up.

As for the design, does your building department require a stamped set of drawings from an engineer?

There are a lot of NFPA rules to consider in a church, depending on the number of people the church will accomadate. Such as: exit lights, emergency lights, fire alarm systems, voice evac systems. If you fail to install these if required, even if the church does'nt want to pay for them, you could be held liable if something happens down the road, no matter what your contract says.

Good luck with the job

 

[Guest]

Re: Bidding on a new church

I have been to many churches with weak electrical systems. Very beautiful. Very sacred. Not too functional. Then when it gets really dicey and the A/C or heat stops working they have to have a capital drive to upgrade the electrical system. By then they have patched and added on to it a bazillion times.

../Wayne C.

[ September 23, 2003, 08:28 PM: Message edited by: awwt ]

 

[tshephard]

Re: Bidding on a new church

I'm gonna have to reply on this one....
I attend a church with a 40 foot tower and 25 foot lamps...
I really feel it's criminal that the EMP engineer did not include a lift system and storage in the original design.
We have wasps in the tower and an annual cost to change the lamps that is outrageous....
The EMP engineer should have spec'ed a manual or battery man lift and a storage space.
We pay at least $1000 per trip for a crane to lift a craftsman to look each problem.
And the original engineer just slides on by.....