c/construction-software

36

nora10•18d ago

Put Procore and Buildertrend head to head on a 50-unit townhouse job - the winner was obvious by week 2

So my boss made me run the same job in both Procore and Buildertrend last quarter to see which we should buy. Procore looked fancy but it took my foreman 45 minutes just to log a daily report because there were too many menus. Buildertrend let him punch in his hours and photos in under 10 minutes once I set up the templates. We had 14 subs on site and Buildertrend's schedule sync actually worked without glitches, while Procore kept dropping updates. The cost difference was about $300 a month which sealed it for our small firm. Has anyone else run a side by side test like this or am I weird?

29

craig.parker•21d ago

I finally had a perfect week with Procore after months of fighting it

Last Tuesday we wrapped up a $340,000 school renovation in Nashville and for once every submittal, RFI, and daily log synced without a single error. Has anyone else had a project where the software just clicked and made your job easier instead of harder?

7

ivan211•22d ago

Yesterday was a total disaster with our job scheduling software

We had 6 crews working on different sites around Denver, and the dispatch system just froze at 6 AM. My foreman called me screaming because he couldn't see where his guys were supposed to go. Turns out the cloud sync failed overnight and nobody got the updated schedule. I spent the whole morning on hold with their support line while crews sat around at the warehouse doing nothing. Lost about 3 hours of labor across all sites, which is probably around $900 in wages down the drain. The worst part is this is the third time this month the system has glitched on us. Has anyone else had issues with cloud-based scheduling tools failing on busy days?

28

jordan653•22d ago

Walked onto a job site in Phoenix last Tuesday and watched a foreman flip between 7 different apps just to check the day's schedule

I was there doing a quick consult and this guy had Procore open for one thing, PlanGrid for drawings, some random text chain for change orders, and then he pulls out a paper clipboard for his daily log. It was a total mess. He told me he spends about 45 minutes every morning just syncing info between all these platforms. How is that still normal in 2024? Does anyone actually have a streamlined system where their software actually talks to each other, or are we all just stuck using a dozen tools that do the same thing?

19

sean_foster52•23d ago

Tried Procore vs Buildertrend for my small crew of 5 in Denver

Ran a 30 day trial on both for a basement finish job last month. Procore felt like driving a Ferrari on a dirt road - way too much firepower for what I needed. Buildertrend was clunkier but actually fit how we work. Punch lists and RFIs went smoother than I expected. Has anyone else with a crew under 10 found a system that doesn't feel like overkill?

3

jordan653•25d ago

Spent 2 years exporting takeoffs wrong from PlanSwift

I was exporting all my takeoff quantities as total counts instead of per sheet for framing projects. A guy from the lumber yard called me up and asked why my numbers were always double what the prints showed. I felt like an idiot but at least the material orders started making sense after that. Anybody else learn a basic software feature way later than they should have?

23

tylerw92•25d ago

PSA: Fieldwire actually got slower after their big update last fall

Everyone keeps raving about the Fieldwire interface changes from October, but I've seen the opposite on my jobsites. Before the update I could load a 50-page set of plans in about 12 seconds on my iPad. Now it takes 25 to 30 seconds for the same file, and I've timed it three times this week alone. They added those color-coded pin filters which look nice, but the app hangs every time I try to switch between markup layers. My foreman switched to PlanGrid last month after the same glitches, and his load times dropped back to 10 seconds. Has anyone else noticed their older iPads struggling worse after this update?

24

ninas70•26d ago

Bluebeam crashed on me 3 times during a takeoff yesterday and I lost 2 hours of work

Had to redo all my quantity counts from scratch because the autosave file was corrupted too, anyone else had Bluebeam just die mid-project for no reason?

14

derek939•26d ago

Heard a foreman say 'measure once, cut once' is a myth for digital takeoffs

Last Thursday I was at a job site in Austin and overheard a foreman talking to a new guy. He said 'measure once, cut once' is a myth now with digital takeoff software. Said the real trick is to check your model against the site three times before you order materials. That hit home for me. I've been using PlanSwift for about 6 months and I caught myself trusting the numbers too fast. Ended up short on lumber for a deck project last spring because I didn't double check the scale. So now I run every takeoff through two different views in the software before I hit print. Has anyone else made that mistake or found a better way to verify their counts?

20

julia286•27d ago

TIL the hard way that digital takeoff tools aren't all the same

I had to choose between Bluebeam and PlanSwift for a 120-unit apartment bid last month, went with PlanSwift because it was cheaper, and ended up missing a whole wing of the building because the scaling tool glitched. Now the GC is asking for re-bid numbers and I'm scrambling to fix it - has anyone else had scaling issues wreck a bid?

13

karenw90•1mo ago

Hit 500 RFIs on a single job site - is that normal or insane?

I been tracking our RFI count on this big hospital build in Phoenix and we just crossed 500. That just feels bonkers to me. Half the time its stupid stuff like the MEP drawings dont match the structural ones and we gotta wait a week for someone to reply. The other half feels like the GC is just covering their butt in case something goes wrong later. But then I talk to older guys on site and they say 500 is nothing, theyve seen over a thousand on a big job. So which is it? Are we just bad at coordinating or is this the new normal with how fast everything moves now? Has anyone else hit a number that made them stop and wonder if the software or the process is the real problem here?

9

sean_murray•1mo ago

Finally gave up on manual pencil takeoffs after 12 years

I used to do all my quantity takeoffs by hand with a scale ruler and colored pencils for every bid. Last month I tried Bluebeam Revu on a 40,000 sq ft commercial project in Phoenix and it cut my takeoff time by about 6 hours. Has anyone else made the switch and found a feature that really sold you on the software?

22

dakota_rivera•1mo ago

I keep seeing field guys use the wrong measurement units in their takeoff software

Was on a job in Austin last week checking a subcontractor's digital takeoff for a 20-unit apartment build. They had all their concrete volumes in linear feet instead of cubic yards. That's a 3x error on a pour that was already tight on budget. I've noticed this at least 4 times in the past 6 months across different crews. The software lets you pick units but nobody trains the new guys on checking that dropdown. Anyone else catching this kind of unit mix-up on your projects?

27

rose_hart31•1mo ago

Switched my mind on digital takeoff tools after a bad Monday

I always thought manual takeoffs were fine and digital stuff was just extra cost. Last week I had to measure a 40-unit apartment complex and it took me almost 8 hours with a scale and paper. My buddy showed me his software did the same job in 45 minutes with auto-count features. That kind of time difference is hard to ignore when you have deadlines breathing down your neck. Has anyone else found a specific digital tool that actually cuts their estimating time in half?

0

johnson.ryan•1mo ago

Just realized my project schedule tool was hiding a simple dependency trick

Spent two months manually linking tasks in Procore until a colleague showed me the auto-detect feature based on start/end dates, which saved me about 6 hours of setup time on our last commercial build in Austin, has anyone else found hidden features in their software that made a big difference?

5

noahcampbell•1mo ago

Shoutout to my $30 laser level for helping me hang 12 cabinets in 2 hours flat

I tried using a cheap laser level from Amazon on my last kitchen job and it actually saved me from redoing the whole layout because the bubble level I was using before was off by a quarter inch, has anyone else been surprised by what a basic tool can do?

27

the_val•1mo ago

That time a drywall sub in Cleveland called me out on my punch list

I used to check my work against the blueprints and call it good. Then a drywall foreman at a condo job in Cleveland spent 10 minutes showing me how my door casing gaps were all off by 1/8 inch because I never looked at the actual framing tolerances. He said the prints are a suggestion, the walls are reality. I started field measuring everything before ordering trims, and my callback rate dropped by almost half in 6 months. Has anyone else had a trade teach them a better way to use software for as-built checks?

12

river182•1mo ago

Had a nightmare week with takeoff software on a condo job

Last Monday my estimating platform kept freezing during a 45-unit condo takeoff in Phoenix. Lost 3 hours of measurements because the auto-save didn't trigger. Anyone else's software crash right when you need it most?

7

caseyw12•1mo ago

Hot take: Project management software is making field guys slower, not faster

I was on a job site in Austin last month, standing on the second floor of a mixed-use building, trying to get a concrete pour approved. The foreman had to open three different apps on his phone just to find the current revision of the foundation plan. Then he had to wait for the superintendent to accept a digital RFI before we could move. Meanwhile the concrete truck was sitting there for 45 minutes, and I could hear the driver yelling from the street. That delay cost us about 800 bucks in waiting time. The whole idea of these apps was to speed things up, but I'm seeing guys standing around staring at screens way more than they ever did with paper blueprints. Has anyone else run into a situation where the software added more steps than it saved?

15

the_henry•1mo ago

TIL Bluebeam has a batch link feature that saved me 6 hours on a project

I was doing a takeoff for a 12 unit apartment complex in Portland last week and had to link 50 pages of drawings to specs manually. My coworker saw me clicking away and showed me the batch link tool in Bluebeam. It automatically matches sheet numbers to spec sections if you set up the naming right. Anyone else find a hidden feature in their software that cut their time way down?

7

jesseb20•1mo ago

Got burned by a bad takeoff on a $45k job in Denver

Was using PlanSwift for a commercial bid last month and the automatic takeoff missed like 15% of the drywall because the PDF had some weird layer issue. Client caught it during the walkthrough and I had to eat the extra cost since my contract said 'based on digital takeoff.' Now I manually double check every single room before I hit send. Anybody else have a software screw up that cost them real money?

19

jamesmason•1mo ago

Pro tip: your Procore punch list photos are probably not syncing right now

I keep seeing crews in my area upload photos to a punch list item, but they're not actually attaching to the right location in the project. It's because the app caches the list and you need to manually refresh it before you start taking pictures. We lost a full day of work on a Denver site last month because of this, thinking issues were documented when they weren't. Has anyone else run into this specific sync bug with field photos?

14

sethc12•1mo ago

Just blew $800 on a scheduling add-on that didn't even sync with our main system

We paid for a fancy scheduling module last month, thinking it would talk to our Procore setup, but it just created a separate calendar we had to update by hand. It took my crew chief two full days to move everything over before we gave up and ate the cost. Has anyone found a good scheduling tool that actually works with Procore without a ton of extra work?

22

sanchez.mia•1mo ago

Update: Our Procore schedule got wrecked by a simple rain delay and it was weirdly great

We had a concrete pour set for a Tuesday in Tacoma, but a surprise storm pushed it back three days. Normally that would mean a week of chaos, but our foreman just dragged the whole timeline in Procore with a few clicks. Watching him move 17 linked tasks in under a minute, with all the subs getting auto-notified, was a real 'oh' moment for me. It showed me the software isn't just for tracking, it's for actually fixing problems fast. Has anyone else had a delay turn into a good test for their scheduling tool?

18

ellis.charles•1mo ago

Warning: Our Procore schedule sync broke last Tuesday during a big concrete pour

The mobile app stopped updating live for our crew at the Denver site. Had to run paper sheets for two hours. Called support, they said a server update caused it. Anyone else get hit by that outage?