Field Notes

My December 8 blog post “Condo Heaven or Hell” discussed some common pitfalls with condo glazing work, but once the decision has been made to bite into that particular pie, there are some key issues to be aware of in detailing and executing the work. After all, it’s hard to turn down any work in this economy, so here are some thoughts to help minimize the risks.

One of the features common to many condos is floor slabs exposed or expressed on the exterior. Sometimes, the windows or curtainwalls will be recessed to form balconies.

Due to project economics and space constraints, such floors are often pre- or post-tensioned concrete slabs that are thinner (8-12” typically) than conventional floor slabs for office buildings and larger commercial structures, which can be up to two to three times thicker. That translates into more floors for the height of the building, less area to be covered with curtain wall and windows on the exterior slab.

But it’s these pre- or post-tensioned slabs that create a lot of issues for condo curtainwall or window wall detailing. First off, at balconies, the detailing ought to include a curb so that the sill of the windows sits 6-8” or more above the exterior floor. A curb is best utilized at sliding or swing doors, where water penetration at the sill can be a problem. This arrangement allows water to drain away from the sill, so there’s no chance of standing water against the sill sealant or waterproofing detail.

The curb, however, creates its own headaches, most notably achieving compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). A curb of any height can be a hurdle to literally get over if the condominium owner has any disabilities, and so the curbs take a second hit.

Incorporating a curb into a poured-in-place tensioned slab is a nightmare for GCs and structural engineers. The sub who has to actually form and pour it is where the rubber hits the road, and the cost to make this all work can be prohibitive. The curb is frequently offered up to the “value engineering gods,” and ends up not included in the final details. Water management becomes more difficult without a curb.

One alternative that’s often explored is putting a step in the slab, where the exterior portion of the slab is 4-6” (or more) lower than the interior part of the slab. I’m not going to profess to know enough about structural engineering, but suffice it to say, the structural engineers will require the slab thickness to be increased throughout the entire floor plate to accomplish this. That’s an expensive proposition. So the step down gets left “on the cutting room floor,” too, never making it to the construction documents.

All that’s left then is to ensure a sill detail that has at least two lines of defense, as the exterior finished surface of the concrete will not be that much lower than the concrete directly under the window sill. The one exception to this: if there’s any sort of paving being applied to the balcony, then the concrete MUST be lowered at the window sill so as to not form a trough between it and the window sill. The sill should never sit in its own trough or channel, there would be no place for water to drain out of most systems, which is usually at the bottom of the sealant joint. If that’s lower than the exterior surface, the sill is going to sit in water, which is NEVER an acceptable detail, condo or not.

This is just one of the design features of condos that the window or curtainwall detailer has to address. And all of these have to be blended together for the wall to work well from a performance point of view, as well as meet the aesthetics the architects want. That’s not an easily reached balance. In a later blog, I’ll address that balance, and who gets to win in the end. A couple of other problem areas to be dealt with in future blogs are:

1. Thermal performance of exposed slabs
2. The effects on curtainwalls and windows of poured-in-place concrete tolerance and building movement
3. Sliding vs. swing doors on balconies
4. ADA compliance vs. water penetration at doors

Throughout this whole process, either in quoting or executing the work, a question that’s critical to ask is: “Is this type of detailing worth the risks?” If already under contract to perform the work, that question’s already been answered. Please, don’t roll over and play stupid – these details demand that you pay attention to this (and all the other condo related detailing yet to come) and do it right, regardless of what the architect, general contractor or owner may request for cost savings. If you choose not to, you may have to pay for the inattention at a later point in time.

Here’s hoping your holidays were enjoyable. I got a great Christmas Eve present: The Eagles beat the tar out of the Cowboys! But alas, it didn’t carry much meaning once the Jets laid their egg against the Giants. But 2-0 this year against the Cowboys, I’ll take that any time.

Dear Santa,

Before I ask for anything, let me at least be grateful for the good things from this last year.  I’m thankful to have a good job, that I’ve been able to make a contribution, and that my health is fairly good.  The kids are all doing well, the grandkids are doing great, we’re going to spend Christmas with them at my son’s place in Chicago.  Our sailor, after an eventful cruise through the Mediterranean in the spring (while Libya was the hot topic) and recently in the western Indian Ocean, reports his ship is headed back to the U.S.  Thank God some of the troops are able to come home this year (for good, at least on one battlefront) in time for the holidays.  May the New Year find that they all can come safely home to loved ones.  Lots to be grateful for, it’s been a good year for the Knickerbockers.

Last year, I asked (and didn’t get, but I am NOT complaining) for the Eagles to win it all against the Cowboys in their home stadium.  Green Bay got the honors; thanks for that.  I couldn’t have stood the heat from my Cowboy-lovin’ relatives if the Blue and Silver had made it.  Fortunately, that didn’t happen.  And then the Phillies choked despite having arguably the best pitching in baseball.  I’m beginning to have my doubts about how much you, Santa, can really do.  Sometimes I feel like Linus, waiting for the Great Pumpkin to arrive.  Will the day ever come the Eagles win it all?  Can you just tell me yes or no?  I’m beginning to know what the Red Sox nation went through before 2004.

This time last year, we were all coming to grips with the economy.  We’d been through two years, 2009 and 2010, trying to figure out if we were smart enough just to hang on.  This year it wasn’t great, but there was no second dip.  Many of us did hang on, and have come to the conclusion that most of the prognosticators appear to be right: it may be 2014 before this all gets sorted out.  Any relief you can bring would be greatly appreciated.  It’s not likely coming from D.C., as those folks inside the Beltway couldn’t add much to stoke the economy.

The glass industry had some scares this year.  Business consolidations being what they are, it hasn’t been fun to see the sometimes adverse impacts on good people.  CRL taking over US Aluminum, now that was one of the good things, bringing back a lot of the people that showed up for work one Monday to find the doors locked, and finding out they were out of work with a note on the door that the locks might be permanent.  The Arch/Binswanger consolidation also has been interesting to watch.

The solar energy end of the business took a hit when one company accepted government money then declared bankruptcy.  Unfortunately, all solar players may have taken a hit from that one instance.  Hopefully, that’s not the case.  Despite such problems, the Sages, the Soladigms and the Pleotints of the world keep showing that business can be conducted on the up and up.

Geez, the storms we saw this year, most notably in Alabama and Missouri.  Want to talk about a way stimulus money could be put to good use?  After all the lessons learned in Florida and Louisiana over the last decade, can we update some older buildings with storm-resistant glazing?  One of the lasting pictures from Joplin was to see a hospital with its windows completely gone, not being able to provide the services to the community in a time of great need.  Can we upgrade these essential facilities before the storms hit, or is it that too much of a drain on the bottom line?  I know it has to be paid for, but…

And for my blessings, I am grateful.  It simply amazes me that my wife and kids still love me, no matter what.  It’s one of the certainties in my life I’ve never questioned, or had reason to.  I’ve been blessed to be always able to put food on the table, a roof over their heads, and clothes on their backs.  Maybe not the high fashion they expected, but they never went without, either.  I’d sweep the streets to keep that from happening.  I’ve always enjoyed the people I get to work with, too.  They’ve all been a joy to be around. For that I am most grateful.

Santa, I know your “to do” list is pretty big this time of year.  Thanks for all you do to bring joy and hope to the world, you and all your helpers, wherever they might be.  Please again, bring us all some cheer, that we can smile and laugh and enjoy the comfort of family and friends again this and in the coming years.  And bless us to have charity and a willing heart to help those not as blessed as we are.  Open our eyes and hearts to their plight, and let us be willing to chip in with our hands when necessary to help those in need.  Again, as Tiny Tim said, “God bless us every one.”  After you get back to the NP, hopefully you’ll enjoy time with the Mrs. and your family, too.

PS:  Just once, can you leave me a note about whether or not you like the candy cane cookies?  They’ve always been my favorites, and I so love teaching the grandkids how to make them…  I’d have better luck getting them to help make them if I could tell them they’re Santa’s favorites, too.

A past blog took the Donald to task over buying Chinese windows.  I wonder if he’s seen the October 25, 2011, report that the City of Shanghai is about to ban glass curtainwalls in schools, hospitals and residential buildings.  The reason:  the walls have inexplicably “burst without warning.”  And, another recent blog took owners and the glazing industry to task about not heat soak testing tempered glass.

It appears at first blush, the two issues have combined perfectly into a scenario Donald could be walking into (or any other curtainwall project here in the States that’s going to China for more “economical” curtainwalls or windows).

When I was a kid, things made in Japan were considered cheap.  Then, over the next 20-30 years, the quality of goods made in Japan drastically improved.  But it took a few decades for them to learn how to improve the quality.  A Datsun (now Nissan) or Toyota in the ’60s and early ’70s was lower than a VW Beetle for quality and durability – the price one paid for getting them a lot cheaper.  Now, Lexus and Infinity – top, luxury models – are at or near the pinnacle of quality ratings.  The Demming Method for quality improvement had some effect in Japan – the Japanese learned, and quality improvements have been made.  A lot of you might be reading this on monitors or other electronic components made in Japan.  The reason:  they’re not making just decorations for the top of your kid’s birthday cakes any longer like they were when I was a kid.  That stuff’s now being made in China.

In many ways, the Chinese aren’t there yet with their quality standards.  They have some institutional barriers to get over.

Some experiences related to one Chinese fabricator that I know of:  They shipped a complete unitized wall system to a jobsite, fully fabricated and structurally silicone glazed.  The structural silicone used for the project was manufactured by a leader in the field.  When the architect asked for the structural silicone warranty, as the specifications required, the sealant manufacturer wouldn’t give them a warranty.  The reason:  the fabricator hadn’t followed the sealant manufacturer’s quality control procedures, didn’t submit samples for testing, hadn’t had the drawings reviewed, etc.  The fabricator submitted, instead, a warranty from the Chinese government that they would stand behind the product.   That did not hold any water with the architect.  The fabricator had to find a local-to-the-jobsite warehouse, strip the glass off the frames and start over – AFTER the sealant manufacturer was assured the QC program was being followed to the letter.  Thankfully, the wall was not installed prior to the architect calling out the fabricator on this.  That would have been far worse.

This same fabricator failed a couple of mockups, the first because the alloy in the unitized wall anchors wasn’t per the specification.  Someone had failed to hold the extruder accountable when the material was delivered to the plant for fabrication.  Instead, a less-capable alloy was used, and wasn’t discovered until the mockup failed.  Lesson:  mockups are never cheap, but they are an indispensable learning tool for projects.  Owners learn that the glazing sub can or cannot perform as specified, and the glazing subs get a chance to fine-tune their design or installation methodologies.  But had that not been discovered, can you imagine that wall “bursting” off the building, be it office, government or other facilities the City of Shanghai hasn’t listed for banning curtainwalls?

These types of issues are symptomatic of what I see coming out of China related to glass.  Replacement lead times are not very friendly to installations here in the States.  It takes weeks to make the glass, then to get it quicker, it has to be air-shipped.  Who wants to wait 4-5 weeks for it to ship via container?

Donald, go right ahead and buy that wall from China.  They don’t have the track record or the experience level yet (that only comes with time) to compete with what’s made in Europe or here in the States.  For every $1/sf you think you save, would you like to know the glass isn’t going to break?  Heat soaking will help that, but it’s not free.  Or that the wall components are actually made to specification, not just run through the system, that they will perform when installed?  All these things have a cost.  Donald, would you mind putting a “Made in CHINA” sticker on your curtainwalls? I’d like to avoid those for the next few years…

On a different note, I was really hoping the Rangers would pull it off.  Game 6 (two outs, two strikes, TWICE? Up two runs in the 9th and 10th Innings each time?)  And can’t close it out???  This is one that HAS to be up there with my ’64 Phillies.  It was a really long weekend until a recent Sunday night.  Anybody see how the Eagles did???  Hopefully, by the time this gets posted, the Eagles will have beaten the Bears and gotten back to .500.  Makes the Super Bowl seem a long way off…

Frank Gehry (designer of curvilinear buildings that are more sculptural than architectural) has put together a group of architects to address 3-D building issues from an architect’s perspective. Does this mean the architectural community isn’t getting what it wants from current software packages, so has to create its own? And what does this mean for the glazing industry?

Gehry’s architectural business has been so successful with the use of Catia software in modeling his free-form designs that he started a side business, Gehry Technologies, which initially extended Catia to architectural applications.

He now appears to be going a step further, given the impressive list of architects he’s assembled. It seems he’s looking for tools that are more open and responsive to the design side of the building industry, rather than the construction side, which is where Revit is strongest. Hopefully they can merge the best of both worlds.

One reason this stood out for me is we’re currently working on a bid with a highly detailed, blast and high wind requirement curtain wall project for the government. In putting together the shop drawing proposal, and in getting proposals from 3rd party vendors for their shop drawings, the question was posed, “Can we get access to the CAD versions of the architectural drawings?”

The reasons are pretty straight forward: elevations, floor plans, building sections, etc. would be simpler to draw as opposed to starting from scratch. It would save significant time in drafting these if the architectural drawings or models were made available – at least as a basis to review and/or revise to fit the project specifics.

When we’ve requested such drawings in the past, the architects aren’t crazy about letting those out unless a waiver is signed agreeing to “use them at your own risk.” Many companies will sign the waiver, agreeing that to do so still puts the engineering efforts one leg up. I agree.

There have been times when the architectural CAD files needed to be revised – that accuracy of say mullion locations was decimal points off (for example, mullions were located at 59.95 inches, but the dimensions said they were at 5 feet-0 inch on center). If the horizontals were cut to the 59.95 inches dimension as opposed to the 60 inches dimension, they’re 1/16 inch off, and after more than 5 or 6 modules that starts to add up.

The more accurate the CAD drawings, obviously the more accurate the subsequent documents can be. One of the things CAD can do for or against you is the GIGO syndrome: if the info going in is garbage, the info coming out is garbage, too. Accuracy is always best in the computer world. If you don’t believe me, put an extra grand in your electronic checkbook and see what happens.

Overwriting dimensions, or spacing things to look pretty in CAD, shorts its capacity to accurately model the conditions that eventually will be built. One argument is that you don’t need to be that accurate, that 59.95 inches is close enough to 60 inches to not cause any serious problems. But after a while, doesn’t the lack of precision catch up to you? Incorrect takeoffs, mis-installation of components in the field, and other impacts could happen that otherwise would be avoided if the drawings are accurate.

I’d be interested in any of your stories, pro/con, with using architectural CAD files on projects. What’s been your experience?

For the time being, what’s the Latin expression, “Caveat Emptor?” Let the user beware, unless the architects are willing to go on record that there are no errors in the drawings. Yeah, that’s not likely or realistic, is it? The Eagles will WIN the Super Bowl first…

Hopefully the Rangers pull out Game 7 Wednesday night. Lord knows the Eagles need to win Sunday, too. You can’t have it all your way, Dallas!

I have a list of words on my desk I got from a previous employer. I don’t know what made me hang on to it, but the sheet has a big, red header at the top: “NO-NO Words.” These were the words (in the context of the company’s primary business) the staff was never to use in written (probably verbal, too) communication. And no, they weren’t the obvious ones all well-mannered adults know to avoid…

The reason we weren’t allowed to use them is each one has a definition that would legally obligate the company and/or the writer to a level of performance the company didn’t want to guarantee. Not that their performance was anything less than what it should be, but those words were put together based on their years of experience, and I think with input from their bonding company. In all likelihood, some lawyers probably contributed, too. Or maybe it was just based on the best teacher of all: sad experience.

Some of the words, I hope you will agree, shouldn’t have much room in correspondence, be it letters, proposals, bids, etc.: “ALL,” “ALWAYS,” “EQUAL,” “GUARANTEE.” The reasons for avoiding them should be pretty self-explanatory.

One such instance where the words have changed is the way architects used to describe the action of a submittal they’ve received and are expected to comment on. When I started in this biz, submittals came back with one of the following boxes checked: “Approved,” “Approved As Noted,” “Revise” or “Rejected.” Many architects’ stamps have changed. They typically no longer approve the submittals, but mark them “Reviewed,” “Reviewed as Noted,” “Not Reviewed” or “Revise/Resubmit.”

My guess is that “Approved” was too broad a stroke. Architects, within the confines of their own professional liability, saying the submittal was “Approved” meant that everything on the drawing had their approval. If something on the drawing was wrong (a bolt undersized for a structural connection, for example), and then if the wall were to fall off, some lawyer’s going to ask the architect on the witness stand, “Well, you reviewed and approved this drawing, didn’t you? What does your ‘approval’ mean?” I could see where that could lead to some “hemmin’ and hawin” on the part of anybody on that hot seat.

This “Reviewed” comment might be a good thing. We ought to be responsible for the technical accuracy of our own work. After all, not many architects are structural engineers – you wouldn’t expect them to know the specific load performance of a ½”-diameter bolt compared to a smaller or larger bolt in a certain application.

It appears the architects now largely review submittals for the accuracy of the aesthetics: the drawings showed a 5’-0” mullion spacing, they can check and verify that’s what the shop drawing elevations show. The system’s 2 ½” wide, that’s correct (or not), that everything’s lined up with the adjacent work as it should be (or isn’t). Those types of corrections are what many of us in the glazing industry get back with the “Reviewed” box check. That’s about it, I guess. A consultant might weigh in on the technical issues, but that’s a different matter. In all likelihood, the consultant’s trying to assure compliance with the specification requirements, and to verify the contractor (or manufacturer, or both) are doing what’s required by the contract documents.

Bottom Line: There’s probably a vocabulary unique to each of our businesses that if you haven’t written it down yet, if you thought about it you probably could. If it’s not individual words, it’s at least expressions.

And in recognition of the campaign season, which by most signs is already upon us:  I APPROVED REVIEWED this blog.  I almost used one of the no-no-words….

Hurricane Irene roared up the East Coast, an earthquake struck Virginia, and it’s the 10-year anniversary of 9/11 – all within two weeks! One thing you can say about natural and man-made disasters is they teach us how to make buildings safer. The glass industry has certainly been one to get smarter from when things go wrong.

In ’83, Hurricane Alicia struck Houston. A couple of curtainwall pioneers, Jack Stevens and Bob Johnston, waited out the storm in some of the city’s recently completed 70-story towers. They wanted to see if code changes made over the years really made the walls better.

After the storm blew through, there was a lot of broken glass in the mid-20^th to mid-40^th floor areas of the curtainwalls, but little damage above that, where one would think the highest wind loads would be. But lower down, there was a lot more damage than expected. It turns out much glass was broken by pea gravel used on the roofs of lower buildings. The wind picked it up and made it into buckshot. Lesson learned, and the code changed. We got smarter about how to build buildings.

Likewise, codes in NYC changed after 9/11. Due to exiting difficulties from the Towers, stairs are now made wider, and reinforced concrete (materials other than sheetrock and studs) is now used for fire stair walls. This offers a greater degree of protection for occupants going down and firefighters going up – both of which may be happening at the same time. Again, we got smarter.

And earthquakes have taught us a lesson or two. Ask a structural engineer in Southern California how much seismic codes have changed in the last 20-30 years. Are buildings safer? You bet. Is something being overlooked? Possibly. We’re human, we’re not perfect. But I like our chances because we learn from past disasters.

Man-made mistakes also can – or should – lead to improvements. For example, there have been a lot of write-ups lately about broken glass in tempered glass handrails in condominiums. Some of the causes might be nickel-sulfide inclusions, which is small debris trapped in the glass that doesn’t melt in the furnace. Small cracks can develop around the inclusions due to thermal expansion/contraction differences between them and the pure glass. Once the cracks reach the tension zone of the glass, the entire lite can shatter.

In the U.S., the primary glass manufacturers have made a great deal of improvement to weed out nickel sulfide inclusions. Glass can be heat soaked, exposing it to extreme temperatures over a short time so that any nickel sulfide inclusions present cause the glass to break before leaving the tempering facility. It’s thought that heat soaking catches 90% of inclusions. We got smarter about how to catch most of this problem sooner rather than later.

Then we got dumb again. A lot of glass companies no longer are including heat soaking in the price of tempered glass. Specifications may require heat soaking, but the supplier or subs put it out there as an “Add” or “Deduct” in a quote, which is another way of saying, “we really don’t want to do this, and we can show you how much it costs, and let you, Mr. Owner, decide if it’s really needed.” When the owner sees how much it is, the heat soaking often gets left on the “value engineering” table because they figure they’ll just replace it during the warranty period if it breaks.

A suggestion here for a possible change in the codes for exterior hand rail applications: eliminate tempered monolithic glass that evacuates the opening when it breaks and replace it with laminated glass that stays in place, but doesn’t fall onto the pedestrians below. You get the transparency of the glass without losing the lite or fragments if it breaks. It may cost a little more, but wouldn’t it be worth it?

Let’s keep getting smarter. We owe it to those whose lives may have been sacrificed on the alter of “we didn’t think or know that could happen.” That’s not to say more problems won’t arise. But as humans, the reason we reason is hopefully to make it better the next time.

As has been said many times before, “Those who do not study the past are condemned to live it.” Sage advice, especially for us in the construction and glazing industry.

The warranty on this blog is seven days. That’s standard (see the small print). When did the warranty period start? From the moment the blog was submitted for posting, or from the time you read it? If this is written on Monday, and you’re reading this on Wednesday, the warranty’s already 31 percent expired if we pick the “from when it was ready to ship” date. Want a longer period? There will be a charge. All kidding aside, this is an issue the glazing industry wrestles with all too frequently.

Most glazing manufacturers and suppliers offer standard warranties for their products. Inevitably, specifications call for periods longer than the standard warranty. A typical fall back is to charge more for an extension. Is what’s being sold a bit more peace of mind to the end-user, the building owner? Probably that’s a large part of it. It’s the reason many in the industry offer extended warranties when asked, or will build them into initial proposals.

Recently, one of our suppliers wanted their warranty to start when it shipped from their plant. It was a pass-through warranty to the owner, who wanted it to start at project substantial completion. Problem: there was a 14-month difference in the two dates, and therefore, in the warranty end date, as well. We eventually resolved this issue to the owner’s satisfaction, but only after a lot of effort on the part of all parties concerned.

When should warranty periods start? As a manufacturer ourselves, we do everything in our power to control the quality of our goods up until they ship. After that, if/when the goods arrive in decent shape on the project, they are out of our control. Other companies install them, hopefully per the installation instructions we provide.

The industry as a whole seems divided on this, and individual companies sometimes compare their warranties to “the industry standard” – what Company A or B might offer for similar products. That’s one thing. I don’t know the answer to this, and feedback would be most welcome. Does the industry need to educate architects to change the specifications? On the surface, that’s not an easy task or one that’s likely to meet with success. Any suggestions?

Hurricane Commentary

Irene’s passed through most of the East Coast as I write this on Monday morning. Having family in that neck of the woods, one pays more attention to the weather. My brother and his family spent last week on the Outer Banks in N.C., and didn’t evacuate with the rest of the tourists (“I’ve been here all week, I’m not a tourist anymore!”) Thinking better of it, he packed it in on Thursday night before they ordered the permanent residents to leave on Friday. Only to drive home to Parkesburg, Pa., (between Harrisburg and Philadelphia), and was without power for about 12 hours on Sunday. Fortunately, it wasn’t any worse than that for most of the region struck by the hurricane. Thankfully, most people did the prudent thing. Now this morning, everybody’s asking whether or not Irene was “over-hyped.” Kudos to the folks in the industry who did do that, suspending ops early Thursday and giving people a chance to hunker down or get outta Dodge. Prudence (once again) being the better part of valor???

Other bloggers have taken their shot at the federal budget crisis the last couple of weeks; let me throw in my two cents.  The Sunday papers were all a-flitter about another hat being thrown in the Presidential contender ring, and this morning one hat was being pulled out.  Maybe the debt deal has settled down, moved to the back pages.  Maybe it shouldn’t be.  It seems like this might be at the root of the problem with the whole economy right now.

If you or I had a credit problem, doesn’t it make sense we’d have to cut expenses, raise revenues or maybe a lot of both?  Perhaps take that second job as a greeter at you-know-where, cut out the trip to the Bahamas this year, no Christmas vacation at Vail, etc.  Meanwhile, the credit card bills still are due and payable every 30 days.  THAT payment won’t go away, no matter what else has to be cut from the “discretionary” budget.

Can all of one without some of the other be possible?  Not raise taxes, just make deeper cuts?  Keep spending, but let’s not raise revenues, or figure out how we’re going to pay for all this?  That seemed to be what was missing during the debate in the OTHER Washington (that’s how it’s referred to here).  Some wanted all of one while not accepting any of the other – from both sides of the spectrum.  It appeared neither was going to be happy without taking all of their jacks out of the game and going home.  Was anything really fixed?

We (yes, you and I, and all of us in the U.S.) have in the form of the Federal Gov’t been spending more money than we take in, and we keep electing people who continue to do that same thing over and over, and because we keep re-electing them, they think it’s ok.  THAT’s what has to change.  If you and I did that, we’d have to file for bankruptcy.  What’s the old saw:  doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is not intelligent, to say the least.

Meanwhile, will it take an Act of Congress to raise my personal debt ceiling?  Probably, but one thing’s for sure:  No one’s going to let me borrow money like the government does.  Shudder to think if we ever come to the point of defaulting on the loans we already have out there.

So what’s the plan for starting to pay down that debt?  What’s going to have to cut to be able to afford those costs?  We take 30 years to pay off our personal mortgages; I have nothing against borrowing money.  Except with the national debt, we’re just making interest payments, none of the principle’s being paid off.

There has to be a plan in place to pay the debt off, too, and no one’s addressing that.  And some things will have to be put aside to be able to make that happen.  That’s the debate, how to change the way we’ve been doing things, not more of the same.  It won’t be easy, and there are some tough choices out there.  But in the end, can it be done?

And now on a lighter note …

We’re less than three weeks into the football PRE-(not the regular) season, and talk about the Eagles winning the Super Bowl has started. Please stop such talk IMMEDIATELY, I’m begging you!  Talk to me at Thanksgiving; we’ll see how they’re looking then.  It’s a known fact that Lombardi trophies don’t get handed out in August.  Talk to me at New Years.  I’m not putting my jersey or hat on until then, since I’m afraid I’ll jinx the whole deal.  Talk to me around Valentine’s Day.  Not before, please.  Let’s talk about the Phillies first.  They have the NL East locked down, I hope.  As for the World Series, talk to me at Halloween.  We’ll know by then…

The 7/14/11 USGNN Newsletter had a link to a story about how the Harmon Tower in Vegas should be torn down since it wasn’t built per the plans and specs. If you went to the comments at the end of the link, everyone from the architect, general contractor and city inspectors to the ironworkers were blamed. Seems like the popular opinion is too many people turned aside, and too many cost and schedule shortcuts were taken. But what’s even more disturbing is how was it allowed to progress so far before someone decided to speak up and say it wasn’t, right?

Oftentimes, the issue comes down to how much risk one is willing to take, and how close to get to the edges of tolerance before raising a red flag. In the life-or-death world of combat flying, a Navy pilot once related when he was going through flight training that there was a limit to how low they could fly, say 500 feet off the ground. He made up his mind that he would never descend below 1,000 feet (except when landing, of course), thereby assuring himself he would never come close to the actual boundary, leaving himself plenty of room for some error. He didn’t ever want to run the risk of being busted out of becoming a pilot if he was found to be flying at 499 feet.

Just how close to the edge of the cliff would you dare to get, to get the straight-down look into the abyss? Where are the limits? Each of us every day probably face even small, incremental decisions about what’s right and what’s wrong.  And each of us has our own lines we won’t cross, things we don’t even give a second thought to.

So who didn’t raise their hand on Harmon and say something was wrong? It’s trickier, isn’t it, when it’s a little bit more nebulous? And everyday, aren’t there little things that go into building curtainwall or windows that we rely on each other to do? For example:  the limit of deflection for wind load is L/175 or ¾”, whichever is less. So what do you do if the deflection is 1/32” more than ¾”?  Reinforce the mullion, or let it go? Both ways may not be jeopardizing the public safety. But more importantly, where’s the limit?  If you’re willing to go over by 1/32”, will you turn your head at a deflection that’s 1/8” over? What about ¼”?  When do we say “enough?”

There are other things, too, that jump out at us in the glazing industry every day. For example, take the over/under cut-to-length tolerances on interior trim. That happened on a project once, where the trim was fit up on the windows before they shipped. When they got to the site, they were 3/8” short of nominal, and quite unsightly. The shop had let them go without anyone saying that it was past the QC limit of +/- 1/32”

There wasn’t any public safety involved, no one was going to get hurt if the trim’s going to be a hair (or more) under the cutting/machining tolerance. So do you pack and ship the parts, or do it over? Or if it’s not caught until the material gets to the field, do you install it, hoping that it won’t be caught? The quality of one’s work (and reputation) probably suffers exponentially to the amount the parts are cut out of tolerance. If we give in once, is our limit for acceptance a little bit higher the next time?

PEs have a professional responsibility when they see something wrong to alert the owner, the professional boards, the GC’s, the authority having jurisdiction or whomever they think is the responsible party. I saw this happen once on a multi-phase project. The engineer was making us do some things on our work the previous phases hadn’t done. I was using the argument, “Well if they didn’t have to, why do we?” It was going to cost a lot of money, some of which was not covered in the estimate. So we made a trip to the jobsite, he and I. In his professional opinion, the previous phase wasn’t correctly done, and he wrote letters to the owner and GC about it, and copied the PE who had stamped the work. Eventually, the previous work had to be retrofitted to bring it up to all the stuff that had been skipped. And my argument for not having to do what he was requiring be done on our phase disappeared. It cost the job time and money, some of each we didn’t have to begin with. But the installation hasn’t blown off the building, either.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out with the Harmon. By the sound of it, too many people let too many things go by. They say some pretty smelly stuff runs downhill.  If we let it roll by us, we’re as big a part of the problem as the original cause. The one question we all have to ask ourselves:  Just how wrong does it have to be before I’ll stand up and say it’s not right?  Bill Swango said we had all the time we needed to do it right the first time. Although fixing a situation upfront isn’t going to be cheap, it’s always cheaper to fix it now than it will be later. Always.