The project continues to work towards getting out of the ground. Sometimes it’s easy and straight forward and sometimes it’s not. In the October 9th Post titled “Sitework-solutions thru teamwork,” in order to stabilize the wet soil in the center of the site, the team agreed on an approach to push rock into the sub-grade to create a stable structural base. While this approach has a history of success, it’s no guarantee it will work and in our case it was not a successful approach. Instead of stabilizing the soil, the rock kept sinking into the soil and the ground was like chocolate pudding with chocolate chips in it.
Time for another solution. The geotechnical engineer believed that the soil now simply needed to be removed. The removal the soil revealed some debris below the surface. But once the deep wet soil was removed, the site began to dry up. In the meantime, the subsurface drainage system in was being placed in its new location around the perimeter of the building footprint where it would provide drainage in this early part of site development as well.
While the contractor has been getting a handle on stabilizing the soil on the site in preparations for foundations and concrete slabs, they have also been developing the overall project schedule. It is often said that “construction is not an exact science,” but developing a schedule that interlaces all the intricate activities, trades, workers, material fabrication, deliveries and more is really an art. When a project schedule is developed, it is not cast in stone. Rather it becomes a dynamic tool guiding the project and it is constantly being updated to reflect the ebb and flow of activities throughout the project.
The Project Manager for Flintco Construction Co. is Justin Woolverton. You will be meeting him in the coming weeks. Justin has been working with his construction team to begin to develop the overall project schedule. The schedule has about 63 activity lines in it thus far, but provides a picture from the beginning of the project to the end.
I have taken that schedule and simplified it to a 9 bar schedule that groups activities that are related. For example, “the envelope” which is the outer skin of the building but consists of the installation of metal studs, insulation, exterior sheathing, stone veneer, exterior metal panels and glass walls. I lumped these items together to simplify the schedule showing the period of time from the beginning of construction of the envelope to the completion of that portion of the project. I have taken some liberties in doing so, but it holds true to the objective of completing the project by next summer. As the project schedule gets more developed, you will see more detail as well.
.
.
Design Matters 