Is it okay copy details from the drawings received for peer review?

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mathan1987

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Electrical design engineer
Hi

I got some electrical plans from a different company for peer review of the TI fit outs done on the core and shell project I worked on. I found some pretty good details on their drawings. I am wondering if it is okay to adopt them and use it or is it unethical/ illegal to do so?
 
I'd say it depends on whether you intend to present it as your own work, especially in competing bids.

Imagine if it was your work someone else was asking about copying; what would your concerns be?
 
Do the plans have any notations indicating that their distribution, reproduction or use is restricted, confidential, proprietary, ... ?
Or was there any agreement with the other company regarding their usage?
 
synchro said:
Do the plans have any notations indicating that their distribution, reproduction or use is restricted, confidential, proprietary, ... ?
Or was there any agreement with the other company regarding their usage?
Click to expand...
there is nothing mentioned like that
 
synchro said:
Do the plans have any notations indicating that their distribution, reproduction or use is restricted, confidential, proprietary, ... ?
Or was there any agreement with the other company regarding their usage?
Click to expand...
We have that on ours but I'm sure its ignored.
 
mathan1987 said:
I got some electrical plans from a different company for peer review of the TI fit outs done on the core and shell project I worked on. I found some pretty good details on their drawings. I am wondering if it is okay to adopt them and use it or is it unethical/ illegal to do so?
Click to expand...
I get your point on having great details to work with, chances are the architect and engineers already made their money for their work but it would be safe to look up the designers and ask them. just say hey, would you mind if I use these details for my personal reference, just don't try to sell them, that's a different story, Its like intellectual property I'd think. better to ask I'd say.

Or just take a picture and keep it on your phone primarily for personal reference, I've done that for simple NEC tables.
 
I would not get all that concerned about it. It's like chunks of PLC code. It's not like there's all that many ways to do things right. A lot of people have gotten to the same point, some by copying from others, but a lot got there independently. The thing is there's only a handful of people who bother to document these kinds of things. But lots of people still do it that way. I think as long as you don't explicitly copy their details out of their drawings it's probably okay because it's unlikely that there's anything really all that different with what they are doing then what a hundred other people are doing other than them writing it down.
 
Well, there's only so many ways to hook up a tamper switch in a detail. Is it fully ethical? Probably not. Has it ever been done in an office I've worked in? Maaaaaaaybeee.
 
mathan1987 said:
Hi

I got some electrical plans from a different company for peer review of the TI fit outs done on the core and shell project I worked on. I found some pretty good details on their drawings. I am wondering if it is okay to adopt them and use it or is it unethical/ illegal to do so?
Click to expand...
It would be totally unethical, bordering on a violation of the applicable State Engineering Code, unless specific written permission is granted. Just don't do it.
 
Imho unethical to take someone else's work without permission.

Perfectly fine to ask.

If the architect said 'put a frombulator here' and the manufacturer had a boilerplate drawing that you are supposed to use, there would be no problems incorporating that boilerplate into your drawings.

The details that you like so much might be the other companies proprietary work, or they might be something that came out of a textbook, or they might be built into the CAD package that they use. Depending upon the source there might be no problem using them, or you might be able to use them for a fee or after you purchase the source.

Jon
 
IMHO there are only so many ways to do certain things that work well. In the long run people tend to gravitate to those ways. If you deliberately copy and paste a piece of someone's drawing into your drawing at best that is cheesy. But if you use the same ideas, it is hard to argue that whatever everybody else is doing is somehow proprietary.

People like to pretend that they are doing something special but for the most part there's probably a ton of people doing it the same exact way.
 
I'd call copying and pasting details and notes unethical. You could be putting your license on the line.

On the other hand, if you recreate a similar detail by drawing something similar yourself, or rewrite the notes in your own words, I think that's fine.
 
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