1224BC: 2009

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Commonality in Construction

Yesterday in class we talked about the commonality that is found in most, if not all, construction projects that take place. In discussion we concluded that the commonalities are materials, state of completion, equipment, site layout utilization, temporary structures, labor, material handling, and mock panels. We talked about breaking a few of these commonalities into sub parts. Examples would be equipment could include hand, and power tools, and idle and active equipment. Materials could be the different types, and the order that it is going to be put into place. State of completion is what stage of the construction is the project at during the time of observation. Temporary structures includes temporary electric, and plumbing. Labor is the people that are working on different tasks throughout the project. Material handling is moving the materials around the site so that they do not get broken or destroyed. Mock panels are little mock ups of usually a wall structure that is built for subcontractors to see and observe. Site layout utilization can be broken down into fencing around the project, parking on site, access to the site, pathways around the site, site organization and housekeeping.

For lab yesterday, the class had to visit the new basketball facility and the new dorm being built on campus to find the similarities and differences between them. The similarities that I found when visiting the sites yesterday for lab were: they both had fencing around the project, the idle equipment was off out of the way of the workers, there was onsite parking for the workers on both sites, they both had trailers for the supervisors, and both of the sites had more labors moving work to the inside because it was becoming cloudy and looked like it was going to rain. The differences in the two sites were that the new dorm facility had a poor site organization where it looked like everything was just laying around but the basketball facility looked like it had organization, the workers on the dorm were using scapling to work off the ground while the workers at the basketball facility used an aerial lift, the access to the trailers for the new dorm looked much harder to get to for deliveries than the trailer at the basketball facility, the workers on the basketball facility looked like they had a better focus on what they were doing but the dorm workers were cluttered around each other not doing much, the physical size of the buildings were different with the dorm being larger so the basketball facility had much more room to move things around on site while the dorm was crammed inside a fenced off area, and the materials were somewhat different for each building. The materials for the basketball facility did not include as much hokie stone as the dorm but it had a flat roof while the dorm used all hokie stone an a slanting roof. The windows were different shaped for each building the color and design of the dorm windows looked darker than the basketball facility.

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Industry Day

Mobile Crane

This crane was lifting this ceiling

section into place on top of the wall

section. The ceiling section had

HVAC equipment on it already

installed. The crane operator from

Kiewit told the group that he could

find out the radius of the area with

his gps on the crane. He allowed one

guy in the class to direct the crane

by hand signals. Some of the signals were a fist to stop, two thumbs

pointed to each other to

close the boom, and two thumbs opposing each other to have the

boom stretch out. A few other students connected the straps to

the crane. The one guy guided the section into place with the

tagline. After about 15 minutes or so, the ceiling section was in

place. Then four men secured the ceiling section to the wall

section with bolts. They then started to add more piping and

other things to the sections.

Survey Equipment from American Infrastructure

The survey equipment is the 3D site on a small LCD screen.

It is very strong allowing the operator to see all the grades and

other things to control the construction site. The survey

equipment can tell a bulldozer where to grade the land exactly

to the point necessary. It saves a lot of time trying to work with

this equipment compared to older survey euqipment such as

grade sticks. It is also a lot more accurate and more precise. It

allows a worker to learn more about the site and become better

at his or her job.

Crane Simulation

The crane simulation is a piece of equipment that is used by

American infrastructure to train equipment operators. It helps

the operators to know their equipment better so that they can

perform their work better. It is important for the operators to

succeed in this training so that they can succeed in their actual

job in the field. The simulator is set up just like an actual piece of

equipment. It has all the same gadgets but the work is being

shown on a television in front of them. The simulator is on wheels

so that it can be transported in and out of the trailer easily. The

set up of the simulator is unique and is a great technique to learn

for equipment operators. The simulator costs about $45,000

with everything including the equipment.

Chandler Inc. Cement Truck

This is a brand new cement truck. I talked to a man from

Chandler named Ricky. He drives the trucks. He said that this

was brand new with under 5,000 miles on it. It cost $160,000

to buy and the company has over a hundred of these trucks. It

can hold 10 1/2 yards of concrete on back roads and 7 1/4

yards of concrete on the highway. It has water temperature

gauges and hydraulic line gauges. In the picture above is the

stack. This stack was $12,000. It is a environmental truck

because no matter what, the stack will never blow out exhaust.

The truck has a 71 gallon diesel tank on it. It also has six gears

on it even though it is an automatic. Ricky said that it drives

great on the back roads and anytime that it is offroad. He said

that this company is in Virginia, Tennessee, and the Carolinas.

Concrete Product Flat Bed Truck with Fork Lift

This is a flat bed truck from a concrete product company in

Christiansburg. It is a Mack truck and delivers supplies from

the warehouse to the job site. The fork lift on the back of the

truck make it easy to unload and load the supplies on and off

the truck. The truck can carry 40,000 lbs. It has a 55 gallon

diesel fuel tank and it is a very durable off road vehicle. It does

not have very good turning radius when it turns around.

American Infrastructure Motor Grader

This was the last piece of equipment that I looked at for Industry

Day. It is a motor grader, more for horizontal construction and

not used in cities too much. I talked to a man named Walter from

American Infrastructure who is an alumi from VT. He majored

in civil engineering, got his masters from Myers Lawson School

of Construction, and now works for American Infrastructure. He

said that he works a lot with other civil engineers using many of

the skills that he learned from VT. He said the most important to

him are his note taking ability and his speeches in front of crowds.

They are the reason he is in the position that he is today. Walter

told me that the motor grader has gps on it for grading. He can

move soil with it within a hundredth of an inch of where it is

supposed to be with the gps. He said that it takes some training

but it is well worth it, especially when you are running the piece

of equipment in the field.

Interesting Points

The things that I found interesting at the Industry Day was the

crane simulation, the concrete truck, and the gps for the heavy

equipment. I found the crane simulation fascinating because

the way that the operators of the equipment can practice

their technique before they even step foot on an actual piece of

equipment. The concrete truck was stunning with the numerous

gadgets that it had on it. The pressure gauges, the water and

hydraulic tanks were unique along with the size of the truck. The

smoke stack was also great because it makes the truck great for

the environment. The gps was very advanced with the way

a piece of equipment can be controlled to the hundredth of an inch

of something. The precision and accuracy of the gps was

amazing.

Monday, March 2, 2009

New Dorm Construction on VT Campus

Workers Grouting and Finishing the Hokie Stones

The two workers on the left in the photo were grouting the hokie stones. The little red and blue tubes beside them was where the grout was. The other black tub on wheel was a dumpster. The men split the work into sections, each taking a small section to do at a time.

The two workers in the photo on the left side were also grouting the hokie stone. These two men were working along side the two in the photo above. They were doing the same thing. In this photo, the man in blue is using a higher level on the scalping to grout higher, while there is another man sitting down under the window, grouting.

In the photo to the left, there are three workers. The one standing up was the boss. I knew this because he was moving around the site to make sure that everything was going smoothly. The guy in blue was the fastest grouter out of all the workers. In the prior photo, he was one window over, while in this photo, he continues to move left. The third guy kneeling on the left side of the photo is also grouting.

There are three workers in the photo to the left. All these workers continue to move to the left. The height of the grouting that they would do would be the height of the scalping on each level. They would do an entire level and then move on to the next level. All three workers were grouting the whole time when I was at the construction site.

This photo to the left shows the workers getting ready to finish up that specific level of grouting. The men worked for an hour straight without stopping when I was there at the site. The two men walking around in this photo were packing up their tools to move onto the next level. The third guy was finishing up grouting on that level of scalping.

Taking out the Trash
The photo to the left shows a fork lift getting a dumpster off the top level of scalping. Right next to the dumpster, it's hard to see, but there is a worker up there. I found out that he was cleaning up the excess hokie stone that being put into place. The wind tarps were up so it was hard to see the workers actually putting the hokie stone into place.

The photo to the left is just another action shot of the fork lift lowering the full dumpster off the top level of the scalping so that it could be dumped and be replaced on the top level of scalping.

Placing Gypsum Board into Place
The worker in the photo to the left is placing gypsum board on the exterior wall of the new dorm. He is having to only put small pieces up at a time because of the confined area that he has to work in. This is the only photo that I have of this job task because it was hard to see him and it began to rain the time I came back around the dorm to see how he was progressing, so he stopped working.

Chipping the Stone

The worker in the photo to the left is one of two men that I saw chipping the hokie stone. He was preparing the stone to be set into place by the mason. He was quickening up the process so that the mason would not have to do all this himself. The tools that this man was using were a hammer and a chisel.

In this photo are the two men that I saw chipping the hokie stone to size to prepare it for being placed properly into place. The man bending over worked in that tent behind him. He used a wet saw to cut the hokie stone to the proper size that it had to be. The other man would then take the sawed stone, and chip all the awkward pieces until he thought that it would fit properly into position along the exterior wall of the new dorm.

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Sketches

The sketch above and to the left is the mock up wall on Perry Street. It is the wall section through cast stone. It is mainly the bottom of the wall. The materials in the sketch are cast stone, cmu block, gypsum board for water protection, a black tarp located on the gypsum board, and bolts that held the cast stone in place connected to the gypsum board and cmu block wall. The sketch above and to the right is the wall section through the hokie stone. It is mainly the top of the mock up wall. The materials include hokie stone, cmu block, the gypsum board, the black tarp located on the gypsum board, and the bolts connecting everything together securely. The hokie stone is located on top of the cast stone in the wall mock up on Perry Street.

The sketch above and to the left is the wall section through the door for my room in Pritchard Hall. This is a basic wall with not much on it with the inside of my room to the left and the hallway to the right of the wall. The materials on it are the cmu block with concave joints that makes up the header, the electrical box, the metal door frame, and the door latch on the door frame. The sketch above and to the right is the wall section of my room through the window. To the left of the wall is inside my room while to the right is outside my room. The materials in the sketch include the concrete header, the cmu block with concave joints to form the wall, the tile ledge that is located right under the window, the window unit, the wall heater, and the knob that is located on the wall heater.

The sketch to the left is my bedroom plan that is located in Pritchard Hall. In the floor plan includes the door entrance, a sink, two closets, the wall heater, and the window unit. The materials that I included are cmu block for the walls, the window unit, the wall heater, and the wood that makes the closets.

The sketch above and to the left is a detail of the steel tread pan for the stairway between the 3rd and 4th floors. This makes up the steps for the stairway. The steel tread pan forms the concrete into the form of the steps once it is poured. The materials in the sketch are the steel tread pan and the concrete that is poured in it. The sketch above and to the left is the detail of the landing for the stairway. The detail shows the different materials that make it up. These materials include the steel tread pan, a steel C to support the landing, a steel brace that is the width of the landing, a little metal bracket against the wall, and concrete to fill the landing.

The floor plan of the stairway is to the left. The stairway starts from the 3rd floor and goes to the 4th floor. The materials in the sketch include a door to the 4th floor, concrete slabs for the landings, concrete for the steps, and steel tread pans to support the concrete poured for the steps. The arrow in meant to showing it is going up to the 4th floor.

The sketch above is the stairwell section. This sketch was important to get as much as I could into it to show how the step area is constructed. The materials include steel tread pan, concrete, steel handrail on the wall, a sprinkler at the top, a light that is right below the sprinkler, a fire alarm parallel to the top of the door, the door frame, the guard right next to the steps to protect the wall from damages, and cmu block to show that the stairs are just not floating in space. The cmu block makes up the whole wall, but I put in only 1 corner so that the observer could see the rest of the sketch without getting distracted.

This is a sketch of the third floor drip pan to the steel decking. It is a HVAC system with various technological pieces stemming off and on it. The materials that I can identify are steel rods, steel I beam, thermometer, the steel drip pan, the duck work, the piping that is insulted, metal pipes for the HVAC unit, steel decking, and a handle to shut the system on and off.

Estimate

Assembly Cost Estimate

The estimating for the assembly cost estimate was easier than the unit cost estimate. The items that I chose for the assembly cost estimate were broader than the unit cost items. They included more items. The actual computation of the items to find out the total cost was not too difficult. It took a little extra time to come up with several items in the assembly cost because RS Means did not have the exact matches that I needed. I had to convert what I had into what I needed.

Unit Cost Estimate

The unit cost estimate was more difficult to do than the assembly cost estimate. It took more time to find the exact items that I needed to include in my estimate. It wa a lot more confusing when I was looking at RS Means to distinguish the necessary items. The calculations, once I got the items, were not too difficult to calculate. The estimating taught me that assembly estimates are more inclusive, so there will be fewer items in it than in an unit cost estimate.

Overall, a detail estimate is more time consuming and much more difficult than a conceptual estimate. The conceptual estimate is much broader on the items, than the detailed estimate. The detailed estimate is more exact. It would be the estimate that would be used as the construction project evolves overtime. The conceptual estimate is an estimate that would be used at the beginning of the construction process to get the price range for the project.