Bolting and welding inspection records, assembled into a closeout file for your project manager.

Steel goes up faster than its paper comes in. Bolting methods get set joint by joint, bolt lots arrive with certificates, installers verify assemblies before using them, and the inspection agency's reports land in batches by date or by area. Welders are named or stamped in reports that live apart from their qualification records. Near the end of the job, somebody sits down and sorts all of it.

For the test, AI reads copies of those records from jobs you finished and assembles a draft closeout file by connection or area: the bolting method and its lot certificates, the pre-installation verification, each inspection report in its place, the welder qualifications each report cites, and a list of every area with no record or an open item. It decides nothing. Your project manager reviews each file, and your reviewer scores it against the binder your team turned in.

The inspection tables set the file's order. Sonoma County's steel appendix to its statement of special inspections, version 04/27/2020, reproduces the Chapter N tables of AISC 360. Before bolting, the rows cover fastener certifications, ASTM markings, the right fastener and procedure for the joint, faying surfaces and hole preparation, pre-installation verification, and storage. During bolting, they cover each joint brought snug-tight before pretensioning, the part the wrench doesn't turn held from rotating, and tightening from the most rigid point toward the free edges. After bolting, Table N5.6-3 has a single row: document acceptance or rejection. Rows are marked O, observed at random, or P, performed, so a complete file holds records for some rows and sampling for others. The draft follows that order and shows which rows the file actually answers.

Every lot has its own paper trail. Caltrans's bridge memo BCM 55-1.03, Attachment 2, dated April 25, 2023, sets minimums per lot: at least three fasteners for the pre-installation test, two for rotational capacity, and five to set the job inspecting torque, throwing out two of those values. It cites Section 7 of the 2020 RCSC Specification for Structural Joints Using High-Strength Bolts, and calls for new pre-installation tests whenever a different lot or installation equipment comes in or new crew members start. Torque numbers from a table or formula aren't accepted, since each lot's lubricant and thread fit differ, and a fastener used in a test can't go back into the work. The draft checks that each lot named on an area's report has a matching certificate and test sheet, and lists the lots that don't.

The method changes by connection. The University of Houston's master steel section, revised January 29, 2018, snug-tightens bolts unless the drawings say otherwise, permits any of the four RCSC tightening methods for pretensioned and slip-critical joints, and sends disputes over installed tension to arbitration testing with the owner's lab. Caltrans's memo expects thread stick-out from flush to a quarter inch past the nut, and treats uneven stick-out as a possible sign of under-tensioned bolts, plies not in firm contact or lots mixed in one joint. The draft carries the method each report names, and when two reports on the same area name different methods it lists that for your inspector.

Welding records point somewhere else. New York's DASNY opens the welding rows of its 2025 statement of special inspections with welder qualification records and continuity records, citing AISC 360 and AISC 370 beside each row; Sonoma's 2020 version starts at WPS availability instead. Both call for a system to identify the welder of a joint. Sonoma's adds that a stamp, if used, must be the low-stress type, and New York's bars die stamping of members subjected to fatigue unless the engineer of record approves it. On demand critical welds, the University of Houston adds AWS D1.8, Section 5, to qualification under AWS D1.1, the Structural Welding Code, Steel. Field welds are inspected by area while the qualification sits in another binder, so the draft records which qualification each report cites. Whether it is current or sufficient is for your QC lead and the inspector.

The gaps are the point. Caltrans's memo has the inspector write any improper storage or handling of fasteners in a diary, under RCSC's Section 2.10, and sends rejected tension-control lots back to the original manufacturer rather than a field rework. Findings like these can sit in a daily report nobody pulled into the binder. The draft lists each area with no record, an open item or a correction not closed out, and names the report it came from. Qualified inspectors decide every inspection result, and your reviewer checks the list against what your team found.

If your reviewer says yes, jobs nearing closeout get the same assembly for about 30 days, drafted from field records as they arrive.

Your project manager reviews every file and decides what goes out, and a person approves each item before it goes anywhere. Results stay with qualified inspectors, and any next job gets its own price.