CHAPTER 2 EXERCISES What is a bar chart? What other term is synonymous with bar

CHAPTER 2 EXERCISES
What is a bar chart? What other term is synonymous with bar chart? How did the other term originate?
What are the main advantages of bar charts that have made them so popular? What are their main disadvantages?
In the following exercises, draw a bar chart that shows the time scale on the x‐axis. Use engineering paper or draw light vertical lines at certain intervals (e.g., every 5 days) to help you read the start and end dates of any activity. Make simplifying assumptions whenever necessary. Be sure to mention these assumptions.
You are running out of space in your house, so you have decided to transform your two‐car garage into a family room. In addition, you will build a simple carport in your driveway. Make a bar chart for this project, breaking your project into 10–15 work activities.
Think about obtaining a bachelor’s degree from a college as a project. You are advising a friend, a senior in high school who plans to attend college next year. Prepare a bar chart for him, depicting all of the courses that he must take from the start of college until graduation. Obtain the program course list. Make sure you do not overlook any prerequisite requirements. Make the following simplifying assumptions:
Your friend is smart. He will not fail any course.
All courses are available during every fall and spring semester.
No summer semesters are included. Your friend will work during the summer.
Your friend’s total load every semester should be no less than 15 credit hours and no more than 18. You can let him take as many as 20 credit hours in one semester only, but only during the last year.
Your friend must graduate in eight semesters.
After finishing the bar chart, show it to your adviser and get his or her approval on your sequence of courses. Note that several correct solutions to this problem may be possible (which is often the case with construction projects).
Draw a bar chart for building a detached shed in your backyard. Break your project into 10–15 work activities.
You are given the task of replacing the worn‐out carpet in your office. Draw a bar chart showing all activities involved for this task (including removing and reinstalling baseboards; removing and disposing of the old carpet and the pad; selecting, purchasing, and delivering the new carpet and a new pad; cleaning up before and after installing the new carpet; and any other relevant activity).
Prepare a bar chart for building an in‐ground swimming pool. If you do not know the steps involved, ask a friend or a local contractor.
Prepare a bar chart for making a cake (from scratch; don’t use a ready mix). Choose the appropriate time unit (minutes, or 5‐ or 10‐minute intervals).
Contact a contractor and ask the contractor whether he or she uses bar charts (they may be called Gantt charts). Ask about the main types of bar chart reports. Which groups of activities are included? Ask if the bar charts are prepared as bar charts or as an output for a CPM schedule.
To demonstrate the concept of summary bars, draw bar charts for building a new home. Use a few summary activities, such as laying the foundation, putting a slab on a grade, framing, electrical work, plumbing, HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air‐conditioning), putting on the roof, installing doors and windows, and doing the finishing. You may need to show some of these activities (e.g., the electrical work or the plumbing) as discontinuous bars because you will start the activity (do a rough‐in), stop, and then return and finish it. Take the chart to a specialized contractor and expand one of the bars. Expanding a summary bar means breaking it down into a number of activities that make up the summary activity. For example, you can expand Framing to Installing First‐Floor Bottom Plates, Installing First‐Floor Studs, Installing First‐Floor Blocking, Installing First‐Floor Top Plates, Installing Second‐Floor Joists, and so forth. Note that the total duration of the summary activity must equal the total duration (not necessarily the algebraic summation) of the detailed activities within the summary activity.
NOTE
1 The notion that bar charts and Gantt charts are two different types of charts is baseless. There is a variety of bar chart types, and any of them can be called Gantt chart. Even though the PMI when defining bar charts says “also known as Gantt charts,” it defines a Gantt chart as “a bar chart of schedule information where activities are listed on the vertical axis, dates are shown on the horizontal axis, and activity durations are shown as horizontal bars placed according to start and finish dates.” This is not much different from the bar chart definition given previously.