Checklist: Before You Submit a Calculation or Drawing for Review

1. State the task and its limits: what this calculation or drawing covers, and what it does not.
2. Identify every input source and its revision: drawings, specifications, manufacturer data, codes and their editions.
3. Show the assumptions. Mark the ones you made yourself and the ones that were given to you.
4. Show the formulas, with the source (code section, handbook or standard) and the units on every value.
5. Check the arithmetic a second way: a rough estimate, a different method or a quick sanity check against a similar job.
6. Make open questions visible. List what is not yet confirmed and who is being asked.
7. Check consistency with related documents: the calculation against the drawings, the schedules, the specification and the other disciplines.
8. Record the revision: the date, what changed since the last version, and who reviewed it.

A quick sanity check

Before you send a result, ask whether it is the right size. A 3-phase 480 V motor of 40 hp drawing 520 A should look wrong, because the table value is about 52 A. A result that is off by a factor of ten, or by a factor of √3, is usually a units or formula error that a rough estimate catches.

When the review comes back

• Answer every comment, even when the answer is "done" or "I disagree, because...".
• Note which comments came from a missed check, and add that check to your personal checklist.
• Do not change anything the reviewer did not mention without recording it in the revision note.

Example: a self-check on a voltage drop calculation

1. Scope: 240 V feeder to a sub-panel; excludes protection and conductor ampacity.
2. Inputs and revisions: load 50 A from the panel schedule rev C; length 150 ft from the site plan rev B.
3. Assumptions: K = 12.9 for copper at 75 °C; single-phase; marked as my assumption.
4. Formula and units: VD = 2 × K × I × L ÷ CM, with the numbers and units written out.
5. Second method: a rough check against a table of voltage drop per amp per 100 ft agrees within a few percent.
6. Open question: whether the architect will move the panel, which changes L. Asked on the 14th.
7. Consistency: the conductor size on the calculation matches the one-line diagram.
8. Revision record: rev A, issued for review, no earlier version.

Comments reviewers often make

• The units are missing or inconsistent.
• The source or revision of an input is not stated.
• An assumption is buried in the text and not listed.
• The calculation does not match the drawing.
• The result is given with more precision than the inputs support.