In the latest round of a heated dispute between McCarthy Building Cos. Inc. and the owner of the distressed McGuire Apartments, a 25-story tower in Seattle, the St. Louis-based contractor maintains the concrete frame’s corroding post-tensioned slab system can be fixed for less than $2 million. McCarthy calls the local owner’s refusal to make “simple” repairs, its ejection of tenants and its proposed dismantling of the nine-year-old building “irresponsible acts.” + Image Image: Whitlock Dalrymple Poston & Associates Pitting Contractor’s summary of pitting corrosion on tendons of 25-story building’s post-tensioning. Photo: Whitlock Dalrymple Poston & Associates Samples Tendon failure tests
Writers of standards—both for general structural design and, in particular, structural steel design—rolled out their 2010 versions this month, completed in time to be referenced in the upcoming 2012 edition of the model “International Building Code.” An overriding goal, say the engineers responsible for the revisions, is to make the standards simpler to understand and use. Illustration: AISC Weld-access-hole geometry is included in steel standard, despite a patent issue. The major editorial change to ASCE/SEI 7-10 “Minimum Design Loads for Buildings and Other Structures” from the 2005 standard is a “complete” reorganization into a multiple-chapter format—first introduced for seismic loads
The U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE), seeking commercial projects for its energy-efficient commercial buildings program, has extended a call for potential projects until noon Eastern on May 14. DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory had issued both a call for projects, aimed at commercial building owners and operators, and a request for proposals targeted at commercial building technical experts.The RFP deadline for the technical experts remains 3 pm Pacific on May 10. DOE’s national laboratories will use money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to select and fund technical
More than five years into a collaborative building-production movement called integrated project delivery, warnings abound: Don’t try this with strangers. New risks replace old ones. Beware of waivers of claims. Get ready to open your books. Expect lengthy contract negotiations. Prepare to share any profits. Understand that multiparty contracts have not been tested in court. Related Links: Insurance for Shared-Fault Projects Coming Soon But Costly The advice is not just from lawyers and skeptics. Even IPD zealots admit IPD may change the designers’ standard of care. They acknowledge there are no insurance products covering multiparty contracts. They caution that successful
While some are testing the waters of integrated project delivery, a group within the U.S. Dept. of Energy is tilling greener pastures by devising a new design-build project-delivery model for fast-tracked, net-zero-energy buildings, public and private. DOE calls the process progressive, performance-based design-build (DB). Haselden Construction, DOE’s DB contractor for the first application of the model—the $80-million Research Support Facility of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colo.—calls it design-build “on steroids.” The 222,000-sq-ft RSF is the largest known net-zero-energy building in North America, says the DB team. Photo: Haselden Construction + Image Drawing: Stantec Siting, Massing and
On April 15, opposing sides in a debate over the fate of a deteriorating, nine-year-old Seattle apartment tower presented their positions regarding the building�s future safety to Seattle�s Dept. of Planning and Development (DPD). McCarthy Building Cos. maintains the 26-story McGuire Apartments, with its corroding post-tensioned slab system, can be economically fixed. The owner disagrees. Photo: Kennedy Associates The contractor and owner for Seattle�s McGuire Apartments are at odds about �sick� tower�s cure. Image: Post-Tensioning Institute Post-tensioned slab The steps to post-tensioning are as follows: Place the tendons and nail anchors to the formwork, cast the concrete slab, remove the
On April 15, opposing sides in a debate over the fate of a deteriorating, nine-year-old Seattle apartment tower presented their positions regarding the building’s future safety to Seattle’s Dept. of Planning and Development (DPD). McCarthy Building Cos. maintains the 26-story McGuire Apartments, with its corroding post-tensioned slab system, can be economically fixed. The owner disagrees. Photo: Kennedy Associates Contractor and owner at odds about ‘sick’ tower’s cure. + Image Source: Post-Tensioning Institute Post-tensioned slab The steps to post-tensioning are as follows: Place the tendons and nail anchors to the formwork, cast the concrete slab, remove the formwork, stress and anchor
The contractor for an occupied, 26-story apartment building in Seattle that has corroding post-tensioning cables disagrees with the owner�s assertion that the nine-year-old high-rise will become unsafe. McCarthy Building Cos. also disputes the cause and scope of the damage to McGuire Apartments, built for $33 million, stated by the local owner, Carpenter�s Tower LLC. Photo: Ken Lambert, The Seattle Times Problems of Seattle high-rise are too costly to fix, says owner. The contractor disagrees. On April 10, the owner announced plans to vacate the building over several months “due to extensive construction defects, which are financially impractical” to repair. A
A structural engineer is poised to be the first to use steel fibers as structural reinforcing in the lateral-force-resisting system of a concrete-framed high-rise in a seismic zone. The application, designed to reduce reinforcing-steel congestion in shear-wall link beams and, perhaps, in shear walls themselves, is based on recent successful performance tests of SFRC link beams at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Photo: Bekaert Corp. Specimen Steel-fiber reinforcing can eliminate 40% of rebar in link beams in seismic frames. Image: Cary Kopczynski & Co. It also allows diagonal rebar to be smaller and more bendable, so it can exit
The contractor for an occupied, 26-story apartment building in Seattle that has corroding post-tensioning cables disagrees with the owner’s assertion that the nine-year-old high-rise will become unsafe. McCarthy Building Cos. also disputes the cause and scope of the damage to McGuire Apartments, built for $33 million, stated by the local owner, Carpenter’s Tower LLC. Photo: Ken Lambert, The Seattle Times Problems of Seattle high-rise are too costly to fix, says owner. The contractor disagrees. On April 10, the owner announced plans to vacate the building over several months “due to extensive construction defects, which are financially impractical” to repair. A
