Asbuilts are mine until i get paid Brian
~CS~
I have to say, I've been forced into that situation as well. I'm not proud of it, but sometimes a man has to do what a man has to do, to get paid for doing it.
I learned that the hard way. Huge project for a ship-to-ship cargo transfer winch control system, lots of expensive vector drives, PLCs, countless hours of redesign and programming, even $100k of custom stainless steel Hoffman boxes with special cutouts etc, meaning non-returnable, no resale value. I took over after the design stage (but before the equipment purchase), from a previous contractor who bailed (that should have been my first clue). After the shipbuilder was 2 months late in paying me my progress payment, I was waiting to meet the CFO and the Accounts Payable mgr walked by with a box of his belongings, headed out the door. He knew who I was, stopped for a second and said "I just got fired. I might as well tell you, they NEVER had any intention of paying you, or any other sub on this project. They are going to declare bankruptcy before its done, they have already spent or hidden their progress payments from the Navy." I still had to finish the project install, so I stopped work on it. The Navy stepped in to demand that I finish for their replacement shipbuilder. Even though my contract was not with the Navy, they said it was still enforceable and it was a commercial dispute with me and the now bankrupt shipbuilder. But I refused unless I got my progress payment from someone. The Navy officer in charge decided to retaliate by hiring someone else to finish it, not me. That 3rd contractor refused to buy the materials from me, so I showed up with a Sherrif and a few trucks and seized all my stuff. After a 6 month battle that bled me dry from lawyers, I caved and took about 50 cents on the dollar for the hardware value, which didn't really even recover my component costs (without the legal fees). But the one thing the Navy lawyers left out all along, and what my lawyers told me to keep my mouth shut about, were the drawings (the PLC programming was clearly still my IP). They apparently thought that the drawings were part of the spoils from Contractor #1, not realizing that when I took over I basically changed everything since I was responsible for performance (at that time). A month or so later, when contractor #3 discovered the error and realized the drawings they gave him were useless, I sold him the as-built drawings and the PLC programming... for what they were worth to me :whistling2:
Ever since then, the as-built drawings were the LAST thing that changed hands, across the table in exchange for the final check. Should that include original drawings of equipment that existed when I arrived? I guess ethically probably not, but that will depend on how much I have invested in the project. On several occasions, I have modified very old switchgear and MCCs where the end user had zero record drawings or documentation and I have spent hours and hours getting records from old and sometimes defunct sources (like Westighouse). If I got them for you, they are mine until I get paid.
