How to do a concrete takeoff in Bluebeam Revu

The S-sheets carry most of what a concrete takeoff needs, and little of it is on the foundation plan itself. Slab thickness and base course are in the general notes or a typical section. Footing sizes are in the footing schedule. Pier diameters and heights are in a pier schedule or on a detail. Wall thickness changes are on sections that can be several sheets away.

Read those first, and write each element type down with the dimension that is not on the plan: "SOG, 5 in", "F1, 4 ft by 4 ft by 18 in", "GB-1, 18 in by 30 in". The plan gives you where and how much. The notes and schedules give you how thick or how deep, and a takeoff that guesses the second half is wrong in every row.

Calibrate the page against a long, dimensioned string before you trace anything, and check it against a second one. Every area, length and volume on the sheet inherits the scale, so an error here is in every number at once.

Then build a Tool Chest of measurement tools named by element: an Area or Volume tool for each slab type, Polylength tools for each continuous footing, wall and grade beam type, and Count tools for each spread footing and pier type. Give each a subject and colour of its own. A Markups list where every line says "Area" is a list nobody can price from.

Revu’s Volume tool takes a traced shape and a depth and reports the volume in the units of the page scale, so a slab traced in feet with a depth in inches comes back in cubic feet. Cutouts work inside a volume the same way they do in an area. The other way is to trace an Area and carry the thickness in a Custom Column with a formula. Either is fine; pick one per job so the list reads the same top to bottom.

Elevated slabs on metal deck are not their nominal thickness all the way through. The concrete fills the deck flutes, and the deck manufacturer publishes a concrete volume for each deck profile and total slab depth. Use that figure, not the full thickness times the area.

As an example only: a 10,000 SF slab on grade at 5 in thick is 10,000 times 5 divided by 12, or about 4,167 CF, which is about 154 CY before waste. Keep that arithmetic visible in the list, because it is the line somebody will question on bid day.

Continuous footings, foundation walls, grade beams and curbs are long shapes with a constant section. Trace the centreline with Polylength, then multiply the length by the width and depth from the schedule or section. A Custom Column formula keeps that multiplication in the Markups list where it can be checked.

Corners are where these quantities go wrong. Two footings traced to their outside edges overlap at every corner, so trace centrelines, or trace outside on one leg and inside on the other, and do it the same way everywhere. Step footings and wall height changes are separate segments with their own section, not an average.

Spread footings and piers repeat. Count each type from the schedule as its own count, F1, F2, F3 and each pier mark, then multiply the count by the volume of one. That is faster and easier to check than tracing each footing, and it ties every footing on the plan back to a row on the schedule.

A footing or pier mark on the plan with no schedule row is a stop, not a guess. So is a schedule row that never appears on the plan. Either one is a question worth an RFI before it is a number in the bid.

Thickened slab edges, turndowns, interior thickenings under bearing walls and depressed slabs at showers or entries all add concrete the slab thickness does not cover. Measure them as their own lengths with their own sections, from the details, and keep them as separate lines rather than bumping the slab thickness to make up for them.

Then take out what is not concrete. Large openings, shafts and stairs in elevated slabs come out. Where a slab sits on top of a footing, count the overlap once, not in both elements. Decide your rule for small penetrations and blockouts at the start and use it the whole way through.

One concrete element drives several prices. Formwork is measured as contact area, the square feet of form face that touches the concrete, so it comes from the edges and sides, not the plan area. Rebar is weight, from the bar schedule or the typical reinforcing details. Finishing is the plan area of the exposed surface, split by finish type. Slab edge form, vapor retarder, base course and joints each have their own unit.

Take them off from the same markups where you can, but keep them as separate named quantities. A cubic yard figure with formwork folded into it cannot be checked against a forming sub’s quote, and a forming quantity that was never measured is the one a sub-quote comparison catches too late.

Keep the measured net volume clean. Add your waste allowance once, at the end, per element type if your shop treats footings poured against earth differently from formed slabs, and show it as its own line. Waste added inside a trace and again on the total is waste counted twice.

Then convert to cubic yards, divide cubic feet by 27, and round each pour up to the increment your supplier sells in. Rounding happens per pour, not just on the grand total, because each truck order is its own order. Export the Markups list to CSV or Excel and the conversion, the waste and the rounding can all be checked in one place.

• Guessing a thickness the notes give you

  Slab, footing and wall dimensions live on the notes, schedules and sections. A takeoff that assumes them is wrong in every row it touches.

• Double-counting footing corners

  Two continuous footings traced to their outside edges overlap at every corner. Trace centrelines, and do it the same way everywhere.

• Pricing a deck slab at full thickness

  Concrete on metal deck fills the flutes. The deck manufacturer’s volume table is the number to use.

• Counting the slab over the footing twice

  Where the slab sits on a footing, the overlap belongs to one element. Decide which, and keep to it.

• Missing thickened edges and turndowns

  They are on the details, not the plan, and they add real concrete along the whole perimeter.

• Folding formwork and rebar into the yards

  Different units, different subs, different quotes. Keep them as their own quantities so each can be checked.

• Adding waste twice

  Once inside the trace and again on the total is two allowances. Add it once, at the end, on its own line.

• Rounding only the grand total

  Each pour is its own truck order. Round each one up to the supplier’s increment, not just the sum.