CASI California Survey Reports Acceptance Criteria - Construction and Manufacturing Tolerances AC 02 -12

Certified Access Specialist Institute | California Survey Reports | Acceptance Criteria

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Construction and Manufacturing Tolerances AC 02-12

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Proposed 10-17-12

Discipline: Access Compliance

References: CBSC Part 2, 11B-104; ADAS

The meaning and use of regulations in the California Building Standards Code must be applied to the fullest intent as necessary to fulfill the purpose of statutory and regulatory law. Therefore as a matter of purpose, this document identifies critical issues of code which must be addressed to assure that buildings, structures and related facilities are accessible to, and functional for, people with disabilities to, through, and within public accommodations, without loss of function, space, or facility where the general public is concerned.

This Acceptance Criteria (AC) is intended for use by Members of the Certified Access Specialist Institute as a voluntary standard for maintaining clarity, consistency and uniform application of criteria for field inspection of projects within California, and may indicate acceptable methods for achieving compliance with applicable codes and regulations, although other methods proposed by design professionals which address these guidelines may be justified on a case-by-case basis.

This standard is reviewed on a regular basis and is subject to revision at any time. Only AC’s listed on the CASI website at http://www.casinstitute.org are considered applicable.

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CASI Acceptance Rating: % [sic]

Code item:

11B-104 Conventions

11B-104.1 Dimensions. Dimensions that are not stated as "maximum" or "minimum" are absolute.

11B-104.1.1 Construction and Manufacturing Tolerances. All dimensions are subject to conventional industry tolerances except where the requirement is stated as a range with specific minimum and maximum end points.

Purpose: Construction and manufacturing tolerances allow minor discrepancies common in construction due to either variation in the assembly of different materials or as a result of how products are made by different manufacturers. During the bidding process, many kinds of materials maybe selected to fulfill the design objective, and often unforeseen field conditions make exact design dimensions impossible to achieve. The California Building Standards Code prescribes exact design dimensions, but also allows exceptions and prescriptive alternatives that detail other design options. Questions prevail about what deviations are acceptable and which tolerance are excessive.

Discussion: Occasionally, state or local administrative authorities having jurisdiction have embraced construction and manufacturing tolerances policies for either new construction or alteration projects that do not comply with 11B-104. The U.S. Access Board has issued a report (attached) which identifies best practices for construction observations related to accessibility which is relevant to inspection work for access compliance.  

Procedure:

Step 1 - A determinations of Unreasonable Hardship with Equivalent Facilitation is the acceptable method of compliance if section 11B-104 is not met.

Step 2 - If the construction and manufacturing tolerances policies of a local jurisdiction do not comply with 11B-104, or if they exceed recommended acceptable industry tolerances as identified in the U.S. Access Board report (attached), the owner might be held liable for accepting such determinations.

Acceptance Criteria: The final CASp Inspected Certificate should indicate that the construction and manufacturing tolerances policies of a local jurisdiction must comply with 11B-104, or the jurisdiction either (1) goes through the process of determining that an Unreasonable Hardship exists due to a Technically Infeasible condition and Equivalent Facilitation is provided, or (2) if the building department reviews all of the CASp report punch list items and allows the following construction tolerances as identified in the U.S. Access Board report: "Initiative on Dimensional Tolerances in Construction Dimensional Tolerances for Surface Accessibility," prepared by David Ballast, January 2011.

Gary Layman

Director of Professional Practice Standards

Michael Mankin

CASI Communications Chair