On Friday 8/3, my firm and I went out of town to investigate a wall of a building on a college campus that we were renovating. The trip took about two hours and I slept in about 3/4 of the trip. When we made it to the campus, we met with our client and he drove us to our site. Greeting us at the site was the contractor and the structural engineer. The building that we were investigating was built in 1907 and from the outside, structural damage was obvious.
We first went to the front of the building and the contractor and the engineer went on the lift to check out the conditions. Not only was the mortar crumbling, but the wall had no support to hold up the windows or the brick. As the contractor chipped away a piece of the wall, the brick fell out the cavity. He did the same thing for the back of the building.
For the back of the building, we found out that the wall was held up with clothes hangers. Also, that area housed mosquitoes in the bushes. We had a bad storm the night before and it made the area infested with bugs. I won't post the picture, but I got 6 bites on my foot and 7 on my hand and arm.
Other than that experience, it was interesting to see how a building was put together incorrectly.
No comments:
Post a Comment