Interning with Ideal!

This past week at ideal has been another enjoyable week. Last Friday was the Ideal garden volunteer day with Magna International, I thought this was a fun way to give back to the local community and a good bonding experience with fellow interns as well as employees from Magna International. Last Tuesday I was given the opportunity to ride to the top of an 86' manlift to look around and take a few pictures which was an cool point of view of the entire project here.

Good Week with Ideal

     As another exciting week at Ideal flies by and I look back at the events that transpired this week I realize that our team did an excellent job diffusing a tricky situation. This week there was a simple safety altercation that got blown out of proportion because of miscommunication. As a team this cost us many meetings and therefore a loss of time in order to ease the tension and get the guys back to work. Although the outcome was not exactly what we wanted, the project continues to move on at an above average pace. I learned the importance of staying calm even if you may happen to get upset; being irrational is not Ideal.
     Aside from this safety issue, I received a  visit from two fellow interns this week, Paulina and Chris. Paulina came out for a few hours on Tuesday to interview/field trip with Jon Anglin. I enjoyed touring the site with them and hope they enjoyed it equally as much. Chris came out for the whole day on Wednesday to watch the process of an AHU being lifted into place on the building. Chris and I had some good conversation about our sites and I hope to find a way on his Milford site soon!

Flint and Detroit this Week

This has been another great week here at Ideal, I had the opportunity to see interesting new jobs as well as continue to watch my teams main job progress. The beginning of this week I spent my time in Flint helping our team with miscellaneous tasks and other small projects as well as watching the construction of our second crawler crane and the work being completed by our original crawler crane. On Friday, Dave and I worked in Detroit and took a field trip to take some measurements and also to visit the Detroit Event Center. In order to gain a better grasp of a sign job we have, we walked through the Ally building in Detroit to find the possible hurdles our guys would have to cross when installing the steel framing for the building sign. This first field trip led us up to the 43rd floor of the building that just so happened to be the roof. In case you haven't had the opportunity to see Detroit and Windsor from the 43rd story of a building, I have attached a picture of that (and a few other interesting events as well). DEC was very interesting as well, it has been a few weeks since I have been there and was quite impressed to see the progress that had been made between my visits. I look forward to going back in august with the rest of the interns to visit the site again.

Progress in Flint

Assembly of second crane

View from the 43rd floor of the Ally Building

Detroit event center

Travis George- Week 8 at Ideal!

     Last week I had a very interesting and fun week working for ideal. I spent the beginning of last week visiting Dylan and his mentor Gus at the Warren Tech Center and briefly meeting Paulina at Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch. Visiting a PDPM job site such as Warren is an interesting change of pace as their scope of work is much different than ours here in Flint. I was able to see quite a few different constructions projects being performed as well as touring one of the onsite GM buildings. Thank you to Dylan and Gus for this excellent opportunity!     
     Aside from visiting the Tech Center, I spent my time in Flint overseeing more of the progress of our project. I find it very interesting to watch how quick such a large building comes together once the construction process actually starts. 

     Because of the holiday weekend, we chose to get a large American Flag and use our crane to hoist the flag for the extended weekend. Everyone agreed that is looked great and was a cool idea for the long weekend! 

One of the many construction projects I saw visiting Dylan!

Two iron workers work in man lifts to secure the truss as the crane operator positions the truss

 

The week ended with a cookout hosted by Barton Malow

Another Week of Progress

Shout out to Glenn, Derek, Jon, Yesi and Alex for setting up a great trip to Fort Wayne, I think I speak for all of us interns when I say we had a great time and certainly learned a lot!

        As another week passes our iron workers continue to erect steel and our office team continues to correct problems encountered by our guys in the field to decrease downtime and therefore increase production. The largest problem encountered this week was that some of the trusses were fabricated incorrectly. Our steel contractor contracted another steel company to do some of the fabrications for this project and unfortunately they attached the mounting brackets on upside-down and therefore the bolt holes on the truss and the holes on the tab of the column do not line up. We spoke with our structural engineers at Ruby and our steel fabricator at Schuff Steel to come up with a solution. Our team decided the best alternative at this point is to attach a new steel plate tab to the columns these trusses will be attached to and cut off the existing tabs.
       Aside from immediate problems we are also working to avoid future problems. After starting the erection process and realizing we are ahead of schedule and other contractors we count on are behind schedule we see that adjustments need to be made.
       As of this morning our guys have began placing the Air Handling Units (AHU) identical the AHUs we saw in Ft. Wayne. As Glen had discussed with us these units are very heavy and must be assembled on site and placed as the building is being built to avoid the need for expensive helicopter placement. I was told one AHU, including the rigging used for the lift, weighs right around 53,000 lb.

I have attached some pictures of the progress this week!

This is the lifting frame we assembled in order to lift the AHU's without damaging them

Progress in Flint

       In the past week, and more specifically the past few days there has been tons of visible progress here in Flint. Until the beginning of this week, the only work completed was prep work so the erecting process can follow in an efficient manor. In the past few days our guys have completely assembled our first crawler crane and have even begun erecting steel a bit early; we had originally planned to start erecting June 20th but our guys were ready and anxious so they started on the 16th instead.
       Although I have enjoyed experiencing some of the beginning stages of a huge construction job, I am definitely excited to watch the main building actually be brought in truck by truck and be assembled piece by piece. Much of my time in the past week has been spent observing and learning a bit more about the process of erecting steel. Aside from observing the guys in the field our team has managed small obstacles that could have potentially hindered the progress in the field. I have attached some pictures I have taken over the past week.

The first few pictures are of the crane being delivered and built..

A panoramic picture of most of the crane

 

Trailers are stacked so one truck can take two trailers back

  

Tracks are being put on the crawler

 

  

 

 The crane is now built and the remaining picture are all of standing steel!

Trucks waiting to be unloaded

Iron workers shaking out steel

This is the very first column being stood.

First truss

 

First Load of Steel in Flint!

As time goes by and I learn how to do more of the daily tasks of my mentors, I gain more responsibility and small projects. I have been spending a lot of time in the last week doing take-offs of structures in order to come up with an accurate weight of the structure. I enjoy the responsibilities being passed on to me and enjoy being able to help my team. Aside from the regular office work, I have been on-site in Flint at the GM facility watching the final preparation being done prior to steel being erected. We have officially accepted our first delivery of steel and will start standing steel in just over a week from now. Some pieces of our first crane are to be delivered today, and the crane is to be built early next week. Equipment and supplies are coming together and the building of the structure is certain bound to follow! I look forward to see the progress within the following weeks.

Travis George - GM Flint

As some of you may already know, I have been assigned and am working on an extremely large body shop addition to the General Motors Facility in Flint. Monday and Tuesday my mentors and I spent our days on site in Flint to ensure smooth progression with minor tasks in order to be able to start erection of steel on time. We ran into some minor problems because of miscommunication within a company we are working with which called for a brief visit with their management team clarifying our plan (pertains to details of a wall) . At this point in time we spend much of our days figuring out the specific logistics of deliveries as well as collaborating with other contractors on site in order to make sure everyone has the space they need to complete their tasks. Aside from the aforementioned, we are also working on miscellaneous change orders, PTP's (Pre-Test Plans) as well as some other minor tasks. I would be lying if I said I haven't already learned a ton about the industry and I look forward to enjoying the rest of the summer learning more and seeing more first hand!

Travis Welding!

Welcome Travis George!

My name Is Travis George, I am currently a junior at Michigan State University studying Applied Engineering Sciences through the College of Engineering. During the summer I plan on living at home in Brighton. Because I enjoy being outside, most of my hobbies occur during the summer months. Some of my hobbies include riding dirt bikes, and going wake boarding and tubing. During the winter I enjoy snow skiing and snowboarding, which usually includes a winter trip to Colorado. I am the youngest of 3 siblings; one brother and one sister. I am close with them and enjoy spending time with them too.

I look forward to an exciting summer as an intern with the Ideal Contracting Team!