These jobs are bid as a lump sum cost. The price is the price, there are no changes, no extras, no nothing. If they missed something, its their fault.
Everyone misses something - that's why I'm here (Hell, even sometimes I miss things too!). To make sure that the Contractor doesn't cut corners. I need to know all the aspects of the job well enough to know:
- how they the building/structure is being built
- how it is supposed to be built
- when something isn't up to par, and how to remedy that situation
- how the pumps & pipe are to be installed, cleaned, tested, disinfected, and started up
- how the wiring is to be run inside the building (and out), how it is to be anchored, what electrical panels are to be installed and details on mounting
- The technical specifications and installation instructions from manufacturers for valves, louvers, waterproofing, pipe, and all the little details inside the building (and there are lots).
- the applicable codes which govern certain types of work/installations (Select portions of the Alberta Building Code, Select portions of the National Plumbing code, Canadian Electrical Code, CSA A 23.1 Cast in place concrete...etc)
- The applicable Quality Tests & checks required for record keeping purposes.
-All the safety rules, of course...
This is a pumphouse/water reservoir that my engineering office designed. It's primarily for water storage, and is currently in construction. Construction value is a little over $5 million. The building is far enough along that you really can see all aspects of the building coming together so I can kind of show you what I do/where I work...etc
Quick Overview of the Concrete Underground Structure:
Its 36 m X 72 m X 5.2 m in size(a little bit smaller than a properly dimensioned ultimate field and a little bit larger than an NHL Hocky rink), designed to be buried under ground - hence the big hole. The hole is built into the side of the hill, so to install the building approximately 22 000 cubic meters of clay and topsoil have been removed, a portion of which is stored onsite for backfilling this bad boy.
It has, on a rough calculation, about 3500 cubic meters of steel reinfoced concrete. The walls are just shy of 50 cm thick in most places, and in some beam sections of it are as thick as 1 m.
All the interior surfaces are hand painted with two coats of a water-safe chemical waterproofing material which leave a rough finish, but ensure water cannot pass through any cracks in the concrete. The exterior is treated with a 2 ply coating of an SBS (waterproofing/air proofing) material on all surfaces before backfilling. Currently only the roof is completed. This Exterior coating is applied to the surface using propane torches and is rolled onto the hot surface creating a permanent bond. This will be covered in drainage board to prevent water accumulation around the structure and insulation prior to backfilling. At the end of this job, only the pumphouse will be visible above ground, and the rest will be turned into greenspace for public usage as a park.
The Pumphouse Building:
Its not done yet, but a good chunk of the structure is up. The pumphouse is a 10m by 20 m by 6 m concrete masonry blockbuilding , with a brick veneer finish on the outside for acoustic/aesthetic reasons, really. The veneer makes it look pretty sharp, and the concrete block is robust, inexpensive, and does a good job of dampening the noise so you're less likely to hear it outside. It includes the torch on air/vapour barrier as well as insulation in between the brick and concrete block. The roof will be a green tin (like the colour of the flashing), with a large green overhead door (where the orange tarp is currently). 
The east and west sides will be backfilled to the middle grey banding on the building with a retaining wall to hold the dirt back for the front approach, which will be paved. The retaining wall will have a board form finish, so it should look pretty rustic. Lights will be installed on the exterior as well for architectural reasons. The end result: I think it's going to look really sharp. The Pumphouse Interior - Mechanical & Process Equipment:
Right now it is a bit of a cluster fuck inside with wiring, and everything being installed right now, but the pumphouse contains all the process piping, the pumps, vents, reservoir access hatches, a lab, and a bathroom, heaters, electrical equipment and control stuff. The mechanical/process equipment is what I'm responsible for selecting, designing, and organizing when I'm involved in the pumphouse designs. The pump shown is the engine pump - designed to deliver fire water supply, operate when there is no power, and if the Town's other pumphouse cannot maintain adequate pressure in the distribution system. It's a small little beast of a pump - 230 hp Cummins V-10 with a Goulds Vertical Turbine pump and Randolph transmission. This baby is capable of delivering about 250 L/s of water to the distribution system and feeding power into the building's electricity systemt to keep the control hardware in operation and issue an alarm to the main plant. As a frame of reference your shower is capable of roughly 1 L/s.
The big blue thing wrapped in plastic is a Singer Engine pump valve (I have a model number somwhere, but it's easier to explain what it does). The engine pump is only capable of running at full tilt, it isn't capable of speed/flow modulation so the Singer valve maintains a constant downstream pressure when the engine pump is running so that all the PVC pipes and residential plumbing don't become overpressured and fail. Any excess water is relieved out the side of the pump back into the pump's suction side.
As well there are two small electric Goulds Vertical Turbine pumps (30 Hp) in the pumphouse to keep water recirculating through the distribution system. These pumps in this application are small enough that they don't speed modulate for flow but large enough that not much water is relieved back into the reservoir from the process piping. Variable speed drives have been primarily installed to facilitate pump start up (instead of a pump control valve).
All the pipes and pumps rest on either concrete bases or galvanized metal stands. Butterfly valves allow flow to be directed through the pumphouse and check valves keep flow going in the proper directions.
HVAC isn't yet started but will include unit heaters, make up air, cooling air (for when the engine runs), louvers and obviously, some ducting.
The Pumphouse Interior - Instrumentation, Controls, and Electric (I.C.E, I.C.E. Baby!)
So, naturally to make all this equipment work there is electicity (wires, cable tray, panels, lights...etc), a brain (the PLC), and then the data collection equipment (Level indicators, position switches, flow meters, pressure indicators).
Electrical installation is not a "neat" process. Like you're home theater, there are wires fuckin' EVERYWHERE. Seriously it doesn't matter how you roll with it, until its all in the tray & terminated, it all looks messy.
See what I mean? It's easier, in this case to tell you what shit is, rather than what it does...
So the panel area from left to right includes: 600 V main power feed, Pump Drive VSD-101, Pump Drive VSD-102, 600V breaker panel, Automatic transfer switch, Lighting panel(top), Transformer (Bottom in box) and PLC Cabinet (the control brain).
Cool beans, eh? All the wires are run in the cable tray - that's the aluminum track that runs about 1ft above the panel. Once installed it looks a little neater, but not much until all the wire is strapped, trimmed, terminated and tagged. Next week we'll have 4 electricians in the building giving 'er shit to get the project done before the contractor's deadline. Good stuff, I think. I'll start getting lots of extra paperwork to handle as this gets rolling with QA/QC reports flowing into my office daily. We're starting to near completion, or at least it is in the very forseeable future now. I'll take some good shots once we are done and post some images of the final product up once we're done and it is all working.
Have a good one!
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