Vulcan Industrial

Summarize the project's program, features and achievements?

The development consists of 14 modern and functional warehouse units with second floor office space to the front of each unit in Richmond, BC, Canada. The gravity system is provided by the tilt wall panels to the perimeter of the building with a combination of internal structural steel framing consisting of beams and columns supported off reinforced concrete foundations and internal tilt wall panels supported off strip and pad foundations providing support to the open web steel joists and metal roof decking. The ground floors consist of 7” thick slab on grade. Tilt wall panels to the exterior and interior of the buildings provide the lateral support system.

The second-floor structure was constructed using open web steel joists and steel beams supporting the composite metal deck and concrete floor slabs. A combination of structural steel braces and the tilt wall panels provide the lateral support system to the second-floor level.

Due to the width of the building being approximately one fifth of the length of the buildings, the tilt wall panels on the short elevations and the interior of the buildings required hold down anchors to be provided to the foundations at numerous internal panels which were required to have the provision for future openings to deal with the seismic uplift forces. The length of the building required the introduction of an expansion joint in the middle of the building at the location of the interion tilt wall panel line. This required for special detailing provisions to be provided for the connection of both the roof and the second floor to accommodate for the expansion joint movement.

What obstacles were overcome related to the schedule, budget, program, specification, site, etc. on this project?

The building was essentially constructed in 4 phases, with construction being carried out up to the interior tilt wall line to each phase. This allowed for multiple trades to be on site at the same time and assisted with the scheduling of the build. Once the roof diaphragm for each of the phases was completed the tilt braces could be removed for that phase which allowed for the commencement of the internal finishes.

Please communicate any engineering complexities or unique features of the panel design for this project?

Panels to the feature corners of the building were constructed to the underside of the second-floor level which required for openings to be incorporated to allow for the framing of the overhangs to cantilever past the face of the panels to pick up the feature glazing from the second floor to the roof.