2025 Texas & Southeast Best Projects
Award of Merit, Manufacturing: Project Scout
Project Scout
S.C.
Award of Merit
Submitted by BZI - Building Zone Industries
Owner Scout Motors
Lead Design Firm Jacobs
GC/CM IPI
Structural Engineer Jacobs
Steel Erector BZI - Building Zone Industries
Building Zone Industries aligned lean construction principles with custom-designed tools to address the specific needs of an industrial manufacturing megaplant. The technologies were conceived from direct communication in the field, brainstorming and testing.
The BZI team used its proprietary Unilink tool to address waste by reducing waiting, unnecessary movement and underproduction. By optimizing workflows, Unilink notably improved productivity and safety. Traditional methods for placing 12 beams took 60-90 minutes. Using Unilink reduced task time to approximately 10–15 minutes, according to BZI.
The contractor’s wide swivel carriage attachment (WSC) addressed inefficiencies with material handling like extra processing of material, unnecessary movement and excess transportation. Traditional methods take approximately one hour per truss load.
The WSC attachment streamlined unloading to 10 minutes, requiring fewer resources. Also, the attachment improved safety by eliminating complex crane operations, further decreasing potential accidents and delays.
BZI also created a new process for panelization that enabled onsite assembly on the ground. Although the process is used on other projects, it was reimagined specifically for this project.
The nine-month job was completed below budget and on schedule with no recordable incidents and no lost-time accidents.
