Okland Wins Excellence in Concrete Award for 111 Main

Okland Construction
Okland Construction
4 min readMar 30, 2017
Okland Receives Excellence in Concrete Award for Work on 111 Main

Okland Construction has been recognized by the Intermountain Chapter of the American Concrete Institute (ACI) with a “2017 Excellence in Concrete Award” for innovative use of concrete on the 111 Main project.

When you think of 111 Main, concrete may not be the first thing that comes to mind. The 24-story office tower’s most visible feature is its balanced hat truss system that supports the building with no load-bearing columns on the perimeter. This enables 111 Main to overhang the adjacent theater by 45 feet. It also creates unobstructed views throughout the building and allows structural glass to envelop the lobby, making it appear that the tower is floating above it. But what does this have to do with concrete?

Before the tower could begin its ascent above the city, we first had to create an engineering and construction marvel that required painstaking planning and execution, and would be buried beneath the ground: the concrete foundation that supports 111 Main.

What’s so Special about a Concrete Foundation?

111 Main’s Foundation Contains Three Tons of Rebar

The concrete in the foundation makes the singular design and elegance of 111 Main possible. The overhang and the lack of perimeter columns are possible because of the hat truss, the hat truss is sustained by the concrete core, and the concrete core rests on the foundation.

Although you will never see it, the foundation is every bit as remarkable as the rest of the building, and it was built to the same exacting standards. An enormous amount of material was used to form the foundation:

· Three tons of rebar

· 2,600 cubic yards of 6,000 PSI concrete

· 19 million gallons of chilled, circulated water to cool it

To ensure the concrete in the foundation hardened without suffering the microscopic damage caused by overheating, the Okland team used a thermal control plan.

A Thermal Control Plan was Critical to 111 Main’s Concrete Strength

111 Main’s foundation was in danger of being damaged from the moment the concrete was poured. Heat, caused by the chemical reaction triggered when the ingredients of concrete are mixed with water, threatened the concrete’s ability to form properly. This danger is called Delayed Ettringite Formation (DEF). DEF occurs when the concrete’s temperature exceeds 158 °F while it hardens. This can cause microscopic gaps to form around the aggregate in the concrete which result in cracking and corrosion.

58 Zones of PEX Piping Circulated Chilled Water to Cool the Concrete

The construction team faced the challenge of keeping the temperature of the hardening concrete within a safe but narrow range. The temperature had to be just right so that it cooled quickly enough to avoid damage by DEF but not so quickly that the foundation was shocked and weakened.

Okland’s construction team designed and implemented a customized thermal control plan that required embedding ¾ inch plastic pipe throughout the foundation and continuously circulating chilled water through the foundation’s footings. The team placed redundant temperature sensors in the foundation to accurately measure how quickly the concrete was cooling. The thermal control plan required the following:

· 58 individual zones of ¾ inch PEX piping embedded in the foundation.

· An 80-ton Trane Chiller to cool the water.

· A 17,000-gallon Rain for Rent water tank to store the water in a closed-loop system.

· A 40hp in-line water pump to move water through the system at an adequate flow rate.

· A pair of customized manifolds to supply and return the chilled water through the closed loop system.

· A third-party inspection firm to monitor temperatures and collect data.

After nine days of circulating chilled water through the plastic pipe in the concrete, the foundation’s temperature was within 35 °F of the average air temperature. The thermal control plan worked. The concrete at the heart of the foundation cooled at a carefully controlled rate that prevented the weakening effects of DEF.

The Intermountain ACI 2017 Excellence in Concrete Award recognizes the careful planning, painstaking execution, and hard work required to form the foundation that may not always come to mind when you think of 111 Main.

Okland’s work on 111 Main exemplifies one of our core values: be distinct. We achieved distinction by seeking creative ways to deliver extraordinary results and gave fanatical attention to quality and execution.

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