When you outsource detail drafting to us, we work in Revit, AutoCAD and Rhino, supplemented by Inventor and Grasshopper and, to a limited extent, Dynamo and Vault. Which package we use follows from your existing set, not from any preference of ours. If there is an AutoCAD file, we draft in AutoCAD.
If the project runs in Revit, we work in Revit and build smart components where that helps. We always work with the latest versions and deliver in DXF, DWG, Revit formats and STEP.
Detail work also comes with its own demands. It involves sheets where dimensions, connections and material annotations have to be right down to the small scale, and where a deviation only becomes visible in the workshop or on site. That requires drafters who master the software and consistently follow your drawing conventions. Every member of our team has more than ten years of CAD experience. We draft and model, we do not do engineering, and that boundary applies to detail work too.
Cable tray routing in the model, built with parametric families that carry the material schedule with them.
Getting started quickly when you outsource detail drafting
To make outsourcing detail drafting work, we need a limited set of information at the start. That means the existing drawings or model, the drawing conventions that apply within your company, and an explanation of exactly what needs to be detailed. You often also supply reference sheets showing how earlier details were set up. Those are more valuable than written instructions, because the standard is already built into them. We also want to know the delivery format and the scale at which the sheets will be used.
Once the information is sufficient, we can start. No onboarding period of several weeks is needed, because the drafters already master the software and the project runs in our own environment with our own licences. We respond to a new request within 1 to 2 working days, followed by a conversation in which we go through the project. That conversation covers scope, sequence and which details are needed first. We would rather start with the sheets that are holding up the schedule than with the ones that are easiest.
A small first assignment is fine, and it is often the quickest way to judge whether the approach suits you. If information is missing, we work out as much as we can ourselves before approaching you, and we bundle the remaining questions. When something is urgent we add people immediately, so the first sheets do not have to wait for a single drafter. What is missing from a specific file usually becomes clear to us as soon as we open the first files.
Clients who outsource detail drafting
Outsourcing detail drafting comes up at engineering firms, architectural practices, contractors and manufacturers, and at companies that have technical drafting in-house but do not have enough hours left for it. The people at the table are managers, team leaders and owners. They rarely come to us with a technical problem. The question is almost always about capacity: too little time, too few drafters, or a peak their own team cannot handle. With detail work there is an extra factor.
Details are the part of a file that gets picked up last and forgotten first, while construction is waiting on them. A project leader who is still missing a hundred detail sheets two weeks before construction cannot suddenly hire someone. We also see that in-house drafters are often too good for the work that stays on the shelf. They are needed on the design or the ongoing project, while repetitive detail work fills their diary. Taking that off their plate creates room straight away.
Our clients are in the Netherlands and our focus is on the Netherlands, so consultation happens within the same working day. We started this service last year because a client asked for it, and since then we have offered it as a standard service. We have now completed more than twenty projects and hundreds of drawings for Firefly, including files in which the level of detail made up the bulk of the work. The picture that emerges is always the same. The bottleneck is not how difficult a detail is, but the number of sheets that have to be finished in a short time.
No ongoing payroll costs and no idle staff once the peak is over. If one of our people is off sick or on holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
What we deliver in detail drafting
In detail drafting we deliver 2D drawings and, where needed, 3D modelling. In concrete terms, that means detail sheets, sections and connection details, typical details worked out for each situation, part and assembly drawings, and the associated dimension sheets. As-built drawings and revisions to existing detail sets are part of it too. When an existing detail recurs in several places, we build it as a parametric component where possible, so that a change does not have to be checked sheet by sheet. In that case the material schedule updates automatically with the component. We deliver the output in DXF, DWG, Revit formats or STEP, and in practice in any common CAD format. A PDF set for construction is often included, because that is what the shop floor or site works with. What we do not do is engineering. We make no calculations and give no structural advice, so the substantive decision behind a detail stays with you.
We draw up that decision and flag it when two documents supplied contradict each other. That happens regularly with a detail set, for example when a typical detail still assumes old dimensions while the floor plan has already been updated. We present contradictions like that to you in one batch. The intellectual property of everything we make belongs to you, so the sheets can be used and adapted further without restriction. At the start, we record exactly which sheet types are needed in a short list. That way it is clear afterwards what has been delivered and what was deliberately left outside the assignment. We go through that list once more with the project leader at the first partial delivery.
Scaling up with a large, variable team
The staffing on a detail assignment adapts to the work. We often start small and scale up with our large, variable team as soon as the volume calls for it. The team is already in place, so scaling up involves no recruitment time. When something is urgent, we add people to an ongoing set immediately. It works the same way in reverse. If the flow of details slows down, we take people off and the flow of hours stops, because you pay no ongoing salary costs.
There are no prepaid hour bundles and no monthly hours subscription with a minimum commitment. If someone drops out through illness or holidays, we replace that person and the work continues.
That replacement is possible because the file sits in our own environment and because the drawing conventions are embedded in the way we have set up the set. A new drafter therefore picks up where the previous one left off, without you having to explain again how the details are set up. Everyone who works for us has more than ten years of CAD experience, and the core of the team has around twenty-five years of combined experience. Sam, our team leader, directs the CAD team and is responsible for the technical side and project supervision.
We do not deploy more people than the work requires. Most detail assignments involve a few drafters, and for large series we deploy as many drafters from our large team as it takes. We would rather set that expectation at the start than halfway through the project. How many drafters a set ultimately needs depends mainly on the hard deadline behind it.
Frequently asked questions about outsourcing detail drafting
Hand your detail drafting over to us
Send us your documents and drawing conventions and we will let you know within one to two working days what we can take on and when.