Start by collecting the drawing items the issued Section 31 62 16.13 asks for in its scattered notes, since it has no opening drawing list: pile locations, capacities, and tip and cutoff elevations, the pipe size and section, test pile locations, splice details, the concrete infill elevations, the coated length, and the structures to protect. Then check that the pipe grade, the open or closed tip and cutting shoe, the infill and its reinforcement, the coating limits, the splice and welding requirements, the cap plates or inserts, the tolerances, and the driving and test program kept in the section agree with the pile schedule, the pile and cap details, and the geotechnical report.
Assemble the review package
Gather the foundation or pile plan with pile marks and test piles, the pile schedule with outside diameter, wall thickness, steel grade, capacities, tip and cutoff elevations, batter, and open or closed tip, the pile tip and cutting shoe detail, the concrete infill and reinforcement detail with its top and bottom elevations, any coating limits on the pile elevations with the mudline and tide levels, the splice detail, the pile cap plan, schedule, and details with any steel cap plate or insert and the pile embedment, the structural general notes with design loads, bending moments, lateral loads, and uplift, the geotechnical report with boring logs, groundwater, corrosivity results, and any rock or obstruction layers, the plan of existing structures and utilities near the work, the statement of special inspections, and the issued Section 31 62 16.13 with Sections 31 62 13.13, 03 30 00, 31 00 00, 01 45 35, and the Division 05 section its Fabrication and Welding articles should name. Follow one pile from its tip and shoe through its infill to the cap before assuming the others match.
WBDG publishes UFGS 31 62 16.13: Steel Pipe Piles as a public guide-specification reference (accessed November 8, 2026). Use your project’s issued specification and amendments for the actual comparison; the guide specification does not automatically govern your project. The checklist below is an original suggested review workflow, not a reproduction of the UFGS requirements.
Eight checks to run against the issued set
Use one record per location or system. The CSV contains the same eight prompts plus fields for source revisions, observed evidence, the review owner, the decision, and closure references.
| Check | Sources to compare | Question to resolve |
|---|---|---|
| Drawing items the section’s notes ask for | Lump Sum note (number of piles, capacity, locations, and tip and cutoff elevations on the drawings) + Steel Pipe Piles article (shape, size, and sections shown) + Test Piles note (locations on plans or boring numbers) + splice notes + Concrete Infill execution article (elevations shown) + Protection of Existing Structures and seismic special inspection notes + PART 1 structural engineer note + Description article + foundation plan, pile schedule, and structural general notes | Because the section has no opening list of drawing items, has each item its notes ask for been found on the drawings: every pile mark with its pipe size and section, capacity, and tip and cutoff elevations, test piles located or tied to boring numbers, splice details where splices are allowed, infill top and bottom elevations where infill is kept, the structures to be protected from pile driving, and the locations needing special inspection, and do the general notes give the bending moments, lateral loads, and other design requirements the PART 1 note says the structural engineer must provide, since the Description article has the contractor design, furnish, install, and test the piles? |
| Pipe grade, seams, and straightness | Steel Pipe Piles article (ASTM A252 grade bracket; seamless or full penetration welded pipe with straight or spiral seams; ultrasonic testing of each weld seam under the ASTM A53 nondestructive electric test provisions; test piles identical to those used elsewhere) + Materials note on strength, cost, and corrosion + Handling article (straightness under an AWS D1.5 clause; excessive curvature rejected) + Steel Plant Certification + pile schedule and structural general notes | Do the diameter, wall thickness, and grade on the pile schedule agree with the ASTM A252 grade kept in the article, where the design depends on a higher-strength or splash-zone steel the materials note discusses, has the article been edited, since its text names only ASTM A252 pipe, does the designer accept both seamless and spiral-welded pipe or say which, is the seam ultrasonic test kept, and are test piles specified with the same section as the production piles they are meant to represent? |
| Open or closed tip and the cutting shoe | Pile Shoes article and note (inside flange open-end cutting shoe in the guide text; outside flange open-end shoe for drilling inside the pipe or rock socketing, with a warning that maximum friction may not be mobilized; closed-end shoe for pile closure or difficult driving) + Pile Shoes shop drawing and certificate + Pile Driving Shoes payment item + boring logs + pile tip detail | Does the pile tip detail show the same tip as the shoe bracket kept, inside flange open end, outside flange open end, or closed end, does the shoe go on all pipe piles, as the article says, or only on those indicated, if an outside flange shoe is kept, has the geotechnical engineer accepted the loss of side friction the note warns of, and where the design relies on drilling inside the pipe or a rock socket, which the note names but no article specifies, is that work written into the section or another issued document? |
| Concrete infill, interior cleanout, and reinforcement | Concrete Infill materials, execution, and field quality control articles and note (Sections 03 30 00 and 31 62 13.13) + Piles quality control paragraph + Concrete Mix Design and concrete test submittals + Section 31 62 13.13 Preparation article (casing cleaned, free water removed, each casing inspected) and Reinforcement note and article + pile infill detail + structural general notes | Where the pile detail shows concrete fill, are the bracketed infill paragraphs kept and the infill elevations drawn, since the section places concrete “to the elevations as shown”, does the project issue Section 31 62 13.13, which this section relies on for mixing, placing, and testing the infill, because Section 31 62 16.13 itself has no article for cleaning out an open-end pile, inspecting the pipe before concreting, or reinforcing the fill, does the infill detail give the bar size and length that the 31 62 13.13 note asks to be indicated, for uplift piles, unsupported lengths, highly bent piles, and the connection between pile and cap, and does the infill concrete in the general notes match Section 03 30 00? |
| Coated length, fusion-bonded epoxy, and touchup | Materials note on seawater exposure (coatings, cathodic protection, or concrete encasement; encasement below the mudline or electrochemically insulated) + Fusion-Bonded Epoxy Coating article (ASTM A972, from the cutoff elevation to a level below mean low water) + bracketed no-splice zone in the Pile Splices article + Touchup Painting article + UFC 3-220-01 protection of materials replacement + geotechnical corrosivity data + pile elevations with mudline and tide levels | Do the coated limits on the pile elevations match the bottom limit filled into the epoxy article and the tide datum it uses, is the no-splice zone kept where a coating is used and do the splice locations respect it, since the touchup article reuses the “same paint” as specified while the epoxy is the only coating the section names, has the designer said what field repair material is accepted at welds and abraded areas, and where no coating is kept but the report shows corrosive soil or water, has the designer of record evaluated protection, as the UFC 3-220-01 replacement on protecting deep foundation materials asks? |
| Splices, welding sections, and weld testing | Pile Splices material article (proprietary cast splicer sleeves or backing rings; Procedure for Insufficient Pile Length) + Pile Splices fabrication article and note (shielded metal arc welding under AWS D1.1, field splice frequency blank, full penetration butt or single bevel-groove weld, square-cut ends seated to bear, alignment jig, shop splices on fabrication drawings) + Splicing Piles article and note + Fabrication article (Section 05 50 13) + Welding article (Section 05 50 14) + Welding Inspection and Weld Testing articles + splice detail + statement of special inspections | Is splicing excluded where one-piece lengths are available or the pile has a moment connection, as the splice note advises, and where it stays, does the splice detail show the sleeve or backing ring kept and the weld type, since the Splicing Piles note still points to PCI standard drawings, which detail concrete piles, has the specifier reconciled the Fabrication article, which names Section 05 50 13 Miscellaneous Metal Fabrications, with the Welding article, which sends splice welding to Section 05 50 14 Structural Metal Fabrications, and edited both to the section the project issues, is shielded metal arc welding the only process the designer intends, and are the weld testing share and the splice, cap plate, and insert welds listed in the statement of special inspections? |
| Cap plates, inserts, cutoff, tolerances, and as-driven survey | Pile Caps and Pile Inserts article (plates conforming to details shown) + Pile Caps fabrication paragraph (pile tops ground for structural-shape caps) + Installation article (cutoff grade; excavation, sheeting, and dewatering before driving to a cutoff below ground or mudline) + Pile Placement and Tolerances in Driving + Survey Data + Damaged Piles article (pile below butt elevation, mislocated or out-of-plumb piles) + Pile Driving bracketed excavation option + Section 31 00 00 Pile Cap Excavation + pile cap plan, schedule, and details | Do the cap details show which head condition each pile type uses, plain embedment, a steel cap plate, an insert, or infill dowels, with its cutoff elevation and embedment, do the cap dimensions keep the clear distance to the cap edge the tolerance article requires for a pile at its lateral tolerance, has the structural engineer seen that the article puts cap redesign for mislocated piles on the contractor and that a pile driven below its butt elevation may be spliced or the footing extended, does the schedule hold cap concrete until the survey is reviewed, with the surveyor’s state filled in, and do this section’s excavation option and the Pile Cap Excavation article of Section 31 00 00 keep the same sequence? |
| Hammers, carried-over text, driving criteria, and tests | Pile Driving Hammers note and table + Impact Hammers and Vibratory Hammers articles + Pile Driving Leads article and note + Pile Driving, Protection of Piles, and Jetting of Piles articles and notes + Wave Equation Analysis article + Production Pile Acceptance Criteria + Test Piles, Dynamic Pile Analysis, CAPWAP, Static Load Tests, Tensile Load Test, and Lateral Load Test articles + payment items + pile schedule | Is the minimum hammer energy bracket filled in from wave equation analyses or project experience rather than read off the note’s table, whose two rows carry the same “up to” capacity limit where the steel H-pile section’s second row reads “over”, does the Pile Driving article’s allowance to drive without leads under a hammer guide frame square with the fixed leads the Leads article requires, are the sentences carried over from the concrete pile sections deleted, on cracking concrete and grout around prestressing cables, effective prestress, projecting strands, and jetting damage to concrete, do the safe design capacity and acceptance basis match the schedule, are tensile and lateral load tests kept wherever the schedule shows uplift or lateral piles, and is the Sound Monitoring pay item, which its text measures per vibration monitoring point, edited to count noise monitoring points? |
Worked example: an open-end shoe under closed-end infilled piles, and two Division 05 sections for one splice
Illustrative example: a two-story squadron operations building beside an airfield apron sits on concrete-filled steel pipe piles driven through soft clay into dense sand, with concrete pile caps and grade beams. The pile schedule calls for closed-end piles filled full length with concrete, but the issued Section 31 62 16.13 keeps the inside flange open-end cutting shoe, and the pile schedule on the foundation plan gives one wall thickness while the pile detail sheet gives another. The project does not issue Section 31 62 13.13, which the Concrete Infill article relies on, so no issued paragraph covers cleaning out and inspecting the pipe or reinforcing the fill, and the cap detail stops the pipe at the cap bottom with no dowels although the general notes give uplift at the braced frames. The Fabrication article names Section 05 50 13, the Welding article names Section 05 50 14, the project issues neither, and the Pile Driving article still warns against cracking the concrete around prestressing cables.
Ask the structural engineer to choose the tip, closed with a plate or shoe or open with a cleanout requirement, to make the shoe bracket, the tip detail, and the schedule agree, and to issue one pile table with one wall thickness. Ask the specifier either to issue Section 31 62 13.13 or to write the cleanout, inspection, reinforcement, and placement requirements into the infill paragraphs, to point the Fabrication and Welding articles to the welding section the project issues, and to delete the prestressed concrete sentences. Ask the structural engineer to detail dowels or a cage from the infill into the cap for the uplift piles, and ask that the installation plan address the height, clearance, and marking of the crane and leads next to the apron, which a UFC 3-220-01 addition on airfield clearance ties to the airfield planning criteria.
See the published structural revision finding. The illustrative scenario above is separate from that published finding.
Avoid a false conflict
Section 31 62 16.13 covers steel pipe piles, their cutting shoes, splices, steel cap plates and inserts, optional concrete infill and fusion-bonded epoxy coating, and their driving and testing. It sends the infill concrete to Sections 03 30 00 and 31 62 13.13 Cast-In-Place Concrete Piles (Active, April 2006 with a February 2024 change), whose preparation and reinforcement articles carry the cleanout, inspection, and bar requirements this section leaves out; concrete pile caps and grade beams follow Section 03 30 00 and the concrete guide, excavation and backfill follow Section 31 00 00, special inspection follows Section 01 45 35, and splice welding follows AWS D1.1 through whichever of Sections 05 50 13, 05 50 14, or 05 05 23.16 Structural Welding the project issues, all Active on WBDG; check those before calling a requirement missing. Section 31 62 23.13 Concrete-Filled Steel Piles, an Active USACE section reissued without revision in February 2021, covers cast-in-place concrete piles in steel casing, including ASTM A252 pipe driven open-end or closed-end, with its own filling and reinforcement articles; steel H-piles are 31 62 16.16 and the steel H-pile guide, and precast prestressed concrete piles are 31 62 13.20 and the precast concrete pile guide, so a schedule that mixes pile types should say which section governs each. Pile capacity, driving stresses, hammer selection, terminal driving criteria, corrosion allowance, and load test interpretation are decisions for the structural and geotechnical engineers and the contractor’s geotechnical consultant. Its Safe Design Capacity paragraph points to UFC 3-220-01, listed as the digital version while the legacy WBDG record still shows the 2012 edition with Change 3 of July 2025; confirm the version your task order invokes. The current guide section cites AWS D1.1 and D1.5, SSPC PA 1, ASTM A36, A53, A109, A148, A252, A572, A972, D1143, D3689, D3966, D4945, E94, E164, E165, E329, and E709, and UFC 3-220-01; confirm the editions your project invokes.
When requirements disagree, follow the project’s document-control and clarification process. Do not assume that drawings always override specifications, or the reverse. Identify the exact sources and request an authorized decision.
Close the issue across the affected documents
Record the location or tag, drawing and specification references, issue dates, observed difference, and the decision needed. Assign an owner and keep the item open until the response identifies the governing requirement. Check the revised drawings and specification references together; a response email alone may leave the issued package inconsistent.
For the overall process, use the guide to drawing and specification conflicts. Mark an inapplicable checklist row with a reason, and distinguish a verified correction from a question that still needs design information.
Where Groundbook fits
Groundbook’s drawing and specification review helps investigate potential disagreements in the documents you supply. Include the relevant specification sections and drawing references, then verify the cited evidence with the responsible reviewers before acting on a finding.