Commercial Archives | Page 9 of 11

The new VA Mental Health and Research (MH&R) building currently under construction in Seattle, WA is a prime example of the benefits The Conco Companies bring to a project with our ability to provide a full range of quality concrete solutions. Breaking ground in April, 2015, the 6-story project is being developed by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and is designed by Stantec Architecture, Inc. and The Design Partnership, LLP. The Clark Construction Group is serving as General Contractor. Highlights of the project include energy-efficient systems, two landscaped indoor courtyards, a grass-covered rooftop and a rainwater-harvesting system for irrigation. The building expects to achieve LEED Silver certification to meet federal mandates.

The Conco Companies Veterans Affairs MH&R Project

Conco is providing all of the concrete pumping, formwork and place and finish services for the project as well as supplying the reinforcement. As the project is on an extremely tight timeline, our unique ability to supply both the rebar and formwork eliminates the need for coordination between several different suppliers and enables the work to move forward in an organized manner. Conco’s shotcrete services will be used for nonstructural site walls.

The MH&R building will be comprised of a steel frame with concrete fill on metal decks at all elevated levels, buckling restrained braced frames grounded on shallow spread footings, concrete cast-in-place walls, and green roofs. Since the entire façade is made up of a customized wall system, the project presents a distinct challenge with its need for high cast in place and architectural walls. To facilitate this, extensive off-site performance mock-up testing and on-site visual mock-up testing was performed.

Scheduled for completion in late 2017, the 203,000 square foot building will house more than 250 mental-health staff members and 60 researchers. Officials at the VA state that the new facility will provide the latest treatment services for veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental-health problems. Furthermore, the campus’ outpatient therapy, clinical research and educational programs will all find a new home at the facility. Designed to create a calm and supportive environment for veterans, the MH&R building will also foster a collaborative, team building approach between the clinical and research staff.

The Conco Companies are a leading supplier of concrete services for the Western United States. We have built a reputation on superior concrete formwork, reinforcing, place and finish, shotcrete and other ancillary services that benefit from our vast experience. We have four regional offices to serve Southern and Northern California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada and Colorado.

The Conco Companies Veterans Affairs MH&R Project

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The Conco Companies are currently providing concrete services for the new 6-story Stadium Tech Center, in Santa Clara, CA. Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, the speculative Class A office building broke ground in March, 2014 and is expected to be completed in October, 2015. Spear Street Capital, the San Francisco-based real estate investment company is developing the property and ARC TEC is the architect. The South Bay Construction Company is the general contractor.

As a part of the project, Conco is constructing the parking structure, which will have one level of podium parking and 3 levels below grade for a total of 1,084 parking stalls. In addition we will provide 442,165 square feet of cast-in-place slabs, 169,014 square feet of slab-on-metal deck, and 35,054 cubic yards of concrete. Floors will have a slab-to-slab height of 14′ – 16′.

The new Center will incorporate cutting edge architectural details and feature 35,000 – 38,000 sq. ft. floor plates and a flexible open plan with 226,500 sq. ft. of column free space. Also the building’s floor to ceiling glass will offer 360 degree views. The energy-efficient design is prequalified for LEED certification.

Located on a 12.35 acre site, the Center has direct access off Highway 237 and is just a short walking distance from the new 49ers Levi Stadium and Joe Montana’s “Centennial Gateway” luxury hotel and entertainment complex. Highlights of the building include a state-of-the-art lifestyle fitness center and café as well as full access to the existing campus amenities such as a full-service cafeteria, bocce ball court, outdoor recreational areas and jogging trail.

We are a leading supplier of concrete services for the Western U.S. and got our start in the Bay Area in 1959 by offering clients the best value on a wide range of concrete services and products. Since that time, we have taken a leading role as one of the top concrete contractors in the region. We currently serve California, Washington, Oregon, Nevada and Colorado.

While Conco is justifiably proud of breaking the World record for the largest continuous mat pour, we are even more proud of doing it safely. Our commitment to safety began with the vision from Conco’s Southern California General Manager, Rick Parker. Five months prior to the pour, he invited John Messing, Conco’s Safety Director, to participate in the planning meetings for the Grand Pour. Rick has learned from his years of experience that projects go more smoothly when the safety department is involved early-on to ensure that safety is built into the overall work plan.

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*Photos provided by Gary Leonard

Rick also made the prudent decision to devote the first-quarterly company safety meeting in January entirely to the safety of the pour. During the meeting, Rick Parker and Pumping Manager, Doug Marquis, provided an overview of the Wilshire Grand jobsite along with the challenges, unique project features, and logistical considerations of the job. John Messing spent the balance of the time devoted to discussing the importance of pre-task plans. He assigned three sub-groups to develop such plans regarding the work that they would perform. At the conclusion of the safety meeting, the pumping crew, place and finish crew, and street-level supervisors all had a unique, customized pre-task plan that was used as the basis to ensure their workers understood the hazards of the work and how to mitigate them.

The end result of the successful well-thought out plan was a highly professional team effort from all Conco employees. The entire team—at all levels—executed the plan to perfection, which resulted in zero injuries for this world record continuous concrete pour.

Among the many unique features of the Wilshire Grand mat foundation pour was the thermal control plan. Occasionally we need to make provisions for the heat that is generated in mat foundations. In mass concrete structures there are two thermal properties that must be considered: the maximum temperature and the temperature difference between the center of the structure and surface.

There are multiple ways to control the overall thermal properties of mass concrete. For the Wilshire Grand pour, one of the first things Conco addressed was the concrete mix design. There are a few common adjustments that can be made to the actual mix, but they all have some impact on the production rate when the concrete is being batched. In this case, working with our supplier Catalina Pacific, we increased the proportion of fly-ash which normally results in reduced maximum temperatures.

The next step was to mechanically control the temperatures. Pre-chilling the concrete was not an option due to the rate that we needed to batch and place the concrete. Nor was there a way to feasibly pre-chill 21,200 cubic yards of material ahead of time so we had to consider post-chilling by means of cooling pipes to mechanically remove heat.

For this, we turned to John Gajda of the CTL Group. CTL developed a thermal control plan specific to the mix design, the geometry of the foundation, and the configuration of the rebar. With help from Couts Heating and Cooling, we implemented CTL’s thermal control plan. Ultimately the system we installed to post-chill the concrete was composed of 18 miles of cooling pipes, over 660 tons of chiller capacity, 40,000 gallons of chilled water, multiple pumps, 3 x 500kva generators, and over 2,200 valves. This includes a large amount of contingency and redundancy for reacting to unanticipated thermal phenomena and providing backup during the critical early stages of the thermal control plan.

Subsequently we installed 24 thermal couplers to digitally monitor the thermal properties of the concrete. For assistance, we teamed up with Twining Laboratories who were able to provide hourly readings of the foundation utilizing Intelirock equipment. By monitoring temperatures closely, we could respond by increasing chiller capacity and/or adding insulation if required. Furthermore, monitoring allowed us to determine when the thermal control system could be removed and the concrete core started.

In the end the thermal control system was a success. The maximum temperature was kept below ACI limits and the temperature difference was well within the ranges required to avoid thermal cracking.

To successfully complete the world’s largest continuous mat pour, one of the biggest challenges Conco faced was to find ways to unload 120 – 150 truckloads of concrete per hour. With the need to unload so many trucks in such a short period of time, Conco’s plan called for thirteen points of placement in the mat foundation. However, only two sides of the project were accessible from the street.

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Since the site only provided access for seven pumps to be positioned to pump directly into the building foundation, Conco’s plan needed to have pumps that were pumping into pumps. Pumps were dropped by crane into the excavation site and two placing booms were fed from pumps nearly 400 feet away. In all, fifteen boom pumps, two high-pressure stationary pumps, two placing booms, and more than 2,500 feet of pipe operated throughout the pour to get the concrete to the foundation. Four of the pumps on this project were new along with a brand-new placing boom. In addition to this equipment, three boom pumps were parked in close proximity to the project in case of a breakdown. None of the backup pumps were put into service as the pumps on the job performed near flawlessly.

To complete the rest of this signature project, the two high-pressure stationary pumps will remain on-site for the project’s duration. One of the pumps is a recently purchased electric pump. This pump is the most powerful electric pump operating west of the Mississippi and is capable of pushing concrete to the top of the structure. It provides our client, the Turner Construction Company, with a zero-emission pump that operates with less noise than a typical diesel pump.

By the end of Conco’s record breaking mat pour, the pumping work all went successfully according to plan. Special recognition goes to our ACPA trained pump operators, and our mechanics that spent countless hours preparing the equipment for the pour.