Air handling and rooftop
- Supply and outside air CFM
- External static pressure
- Cooling capacity in tons; heating input and output in MBH
- Refrigerant type and charge
- Fan motor HP, V/Ph/FLA, MCA, MOCP
Schedule columns
What belongs in an MEP equipment schedule
A survey schedule and a design schedule answer different questions. One states what was specified; the other states what is installed, how old it is, and how well you know. These are the columns the second one needs.
An equipment schedule built from a survey needs three groups of columns: identity and location, so each row can be found and joined; ratings appropriate to the equipment type, so it can be designed against; and provenance — source, confidence, who confirmed it, and status — so the schedule can be defended when someone questions a figure.
Core columns, every equipment type
01: Tag
02: Schedule tag
03: Equipment type
04: Description / service
05: Building / floor / room
06: Manufacturer
07: Model
08: Serial
09: Year / age
10: Condition
| Column | Content | Why it earns its place |
|---|---|---|
| Tag | As labeled on site | The join key for everything downstream |
| Schedule tag | As it appears on the design schedule | Keeps site and drawing traceable when they differ |
| Equipment type | AHU, RTU, chiller, panel, pump | Grouping, filtering and type-specific rating columns |
| Description / service | What it does and for whom | Readable by someone who was not on site |
| Building / floor / room | Location to room level | Access planning, phasing, finding it again |
| Manufacturer | From the nameplate | Parts, support, replacement matching |
| Model | Full model string including suffixes | Suffixes may distinguish equipment configurations |
| Serial | From the nameplate | Identity check and possible date lookup |
| Year / age | Printed date or supported serial lookup | Replacement sequencing and capital planning |
| Condition | Rating plus who confirmed it | Prioritization, with the judgement attributable |
Rating columns by type
Air handling and rooftop
Chillers, boilers and pumps
Electrical distribution
The provenance columns
01: Source
02: Confidence
03: Confirmed by
04: Status
05: Evidence
| Column | Content | What it answers |
|---|---|---|
| Source | Where the value came from — plate, drawing, or a person | Lets a disputed figure be traced |
| Confidence | How certain the read was | Separates a clear plate from a corroded one |
| Confirmed by | Who accepted the value | Distinguishes engineer judgement from a suggestion |
| Status | Complete, partial, or open item | States the schedule's own boundary |
| Evidence | Reference to the capture behind the row | Answers 'how do you know' years later |
Why two tag columns
Site labeling and drawing labeling disagree constantly. Contractors renumber during installation, replacement units arrive with new tags, and tenant fit-outs invent local conventions. If you record one tag, you are silently choosing which source to believe and discarding the other.
Recording both keeps the two traceable. A reader can find the unit on site by its label and find its history on the drawing by its schedule tag, and the discrepancy itself becomes visible.
Status is not optional
A schedule with blank cells cannot distinguish “there is no value” from “nobody could reach it”. Two years later that difference matters enormously and is unrecoverable.
A status column — complete, partial, open item — turns the survey's boundary into data. It is the difference between a deliverable that states its own coverage and one that implies coverage it never had.
Getting from captures to this
The gap between a folder of field photographs and the sheet above is three problems: consolidating repeat captures of the same machine, reconciling site tags against schedule tags, and tracking which values a person actually confirmed.
These steps can take substantial time after a walkthrough. MEP field survey software helps organize those checks during capture and review, and the inventory page covers keeping the resulting register current.
Choosing these columns
How does field survey data become a usable equipment schedule?
By resolving three things the raw captures do not settle: which captures are the same machine, what each unit's tag is once site labeling and drawing labeling are reconciled, and which values a person confirmed. A schedule assembled without those steps carries duplicate rows, ambiguous tags and no way to distinguish a checked figure from an automated guess.
Should a survey schedule match the format of the original design schedule?
Match its tags and its equipment types, but not its columns. A design schedule states intent — specified capacities and selections. A survey schedule states fact — what is installed, how old it is, what condition it is in, and how confident you are. They answer different questions, and forcing survey data into a design template loses the provenance.
What is the most commonly missing column?
Review status is worth including. It distinguishes confirmed information, partial captures and open items so a blank cell is not mistaken for a verified absence.