Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Above is a concrete placing crew working on a large mat foundation. The workers must coordinate their efforts in order to complete the job before the concrete cures. The workers near the bottom of the page are consolidating the concrete with vibrators. While another worker, not pictured above, gives the initial leveling with a tool called a screed. The final touch for this rough finish job is a broom finish done by the worker in the orange hard hat.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen here is the cable anchorage for the Ambassador Suspension Bridge over the Detroit River. This large mass of concrete is designed to deliver the opposing forced on the main cables of the bridge after they have passed over the towers. In the concrete mass the seemingly large single cable actually breaks apart into the smaller cables it is made of for anchoring purposes. The length of each cable embedded in the concrete is very important to prevent pull out of the cables and is calculated according to reinforced concrete code ACI 318.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen above is a steel H pile that will be used on a bridge project. The end of the pile is not strong enough to be directly driven into the ground so a protective tip, called a pile point, is welded on the end. Without the pile point the flanges could separate from the web and greatly affect the strength of the pile and make driving it further into the ground very difficult. In soft ground many times pile points are not needed, however, as a precaution some firms use them almost always when driving piles.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen here is a pedestrian bridge over I-75 in Detroit, Michigan. This type of bridge is important because it allows pedestrians to cross to the other side of the freeway without crossing on the road level or having to go to the nearest street crossing bridge. When new highways are being planned and approved features such as pedestrian bridges and sound barriers are many times included. These features are aimed at local people near the project to allow them to live and work near such highways as comfortably as possible.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen above is the resteel for a reinforced concrete beam in a parking structure laid out before the concrete is poured. The epoxy coated rebars on top (green color) help in beam design by adding ductility to the section. The post-tension tendons (blue color) take the tension force on the bottom of the beam and greatly increase the strength of the beam section. Stirrups are the vertically oriented rebar (green color) pieces hanging from the horizontal rebars. Stirrups are placed at varying intervals to resist the shear force which changes along the length of the beam.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen here is an extremely valuable piece of equipment to many home owners who have septic tanks across the country. This machine empties the septic tank of its built up solids via a hose from the back end of the truck. Emptying the solids is important to do every two to three years to maintain proper septic tank function for an ordinary family home. The solids are then delivered to a local waste water treatment plant for disposal in the manner that ordinary municipal waste is dealt with.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen above is a construction worker putting the finishing touches on the Exterior Insulating Finish System (EIFS) of a building. EIFS are composed of insulation panels that are connected to the building via mechanical fasteners or adhesive. These panels are then covered with synthetic coatings to provide both a visually appealing and weather proof finish. Many times EIFS is confused with stucco, however, technically they are different materials.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
What is this random wall doing in a parking lot of job trailers? It is a mock up of the future building skin that will be built in this area. This allows the architect to see what the building will look like in the area before the entire building is completed. It also allows the finish contractor to gain valuable experience in what is to be expected from the architect in terms of finish detail quality.
Photo Credit: Alex Mead
Seen here is the end of the Ambassador Bridge that extends from Detroit, MI, USA to Windsor, Ontario, Canada over the Detroit River. This particular picture is of the ramp up to a proposed second crossing. However, the permits were not issued and the project was therefore halted and now stands with a drop off to nowhere. The lesson from this is quite straight forward: get your permits before you start the project or you may end up with a useless piece of infrastructure.