Digital Building Components (DBC), the cold formed steel (CFS) manufacturer for the Mayo West Tower project in Phoenix, Arizona, was awarded the 2023 Cold Formed Steel Engineers Institute (CFSEI) Award for Excellence in Design (Municipal Services/ Services”). for his contribution to the expansion of the territory of the hospital. Innovative design solutions for facades.
Mayosita is a seven-story building with approximately 13,006 square meters (140,000 sq ft) of prefabricated CFS exterior curtain wall panels designed to expand the clinical program and increase the capacity of the existing hospital. The structure of the building consists of concrete on metal deck, steel framing and prefabricated CFS external non-load-bearing wall panels.
On this project, Pangolin Structural worked with DBC as a professional CFS engineer. DBC produced approximately 1,500 prefabricated wall panels with pre-installed windows, approximately 7.3 m (24 ft) long and 4.6 m (15 ft) high.
One notable aspect of Mayota is the size of the panels. 610 mm (24 in.) panel wall thickness with 152 mm (6 in.) Exterior Insulation and Finishing System (EIFS) placed on 152 mm (6 in.) high J-beams 305 mm (12 in.) above column with screws. . At the beginning of the project, the DBC design team wanted to explore different ways to make a 610 mm (24 in) thick, 7.3 m (24 ft) long pre-installed window wall. The team decided to use 305 mm (12 inches) for the first layer of the wall, and then placed J-beams horizontally on that layer to provide support to safely transport and lift these long panels.
To solve the challenge of going from a 610 mm (24 in.) wall to a 152 mm (6 in.) suspended wall, DBC and Pangolin fabricated the panels as separate components and welded them together to lift them as a unit.
In addition, the wall panels inside the window openings were replaced with 610 mm (24 in) thick wall panels for 102 mm (4 in) thick walls. To overcome this problem, DBC and Pangolin extended the connection within the 305 mm (12 in) stud and added a 64 mm (2.5 in) stud as a filler to ensure a smooth transition. This approach saves the customer costs by reducing the diameter of the studs to 64 mm (2.5 in.).
Another unique feature of Mayosita is the sloped sill, which is achieved by adding a 64 mm (2.5 in.) slanted curved plate with studs to a traditional 305 mm (12 in.) rail sill.
Some of the wall panels in this project are uniquely shaped with “L” and “Z” at the corners. For example, the wall is 9.1 m (30 ft) long but only 1.8 m (6 ft) wide, with “L” shaped corners extending 0.9 m (3 ft) from the main panel. To reinforce the connection between the main and sub-panels, DBC and Pangolin use boxed pins and CFS straps as X-braces. These L-shaped panels also needed to be connected to a narrow batten only 305 mm (12 in) wide, extending 2.1 m (7 ft) from the main building. The solution was to lay these panels in two layers to simplify installation.
Designing the parapets presented another unique challenge. To allow for future vertical expansion of the hospital, panel joints were built into the main walls and bolted to the bottom panels for ease of future disassembly.
The registered architect for this project is HKS, Inc. and the registered civil engineer is PK Associates.
Post time: Sep-05-2023