Tent Plaza Lets Caesar's Palace Entertain in Style
The Roman plaza from FabriTec Structures of Costa Mesa, Calif., is a single cone polytetrafluoroethylene-coated (PTFE, or teflon) fiber glass structure that rises 50 feet into the air at Caesar's Palace Casino in Las Vegas. The structure was designed to cover a bar and seating area in Caesar's plaza off the Las Vegas Strip, and to complement the casino's Roman theme. PTFE can be used as a durable, water-resistant awning and tent coating material in addition to its more well-known uses as a nonstick cooking surface.
FabriTec
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Lightfair International
May 28–June 1, Las Vegas Convention Center, Las Vegas
Lightfair International 2006 will kick off on Sunday, May 28 with the Daylighting Institute and the Lightfair Institute, which will offer a series of two-day and three-hour workshops. Topics include: LED technology, fundamentals of automated lighting control, and commercial lighting energy codes. More than 240 hours of educational courses will be offered. Over 15,000 architectural, engineering, lighting design professionals from around the world are expected to attend the event.
www.lightfair.com
G-o-o-o-o-o-Al! Fabric Ducts Score for Massive Indoor Soccer Field
Few indoor athletic fields are as tall as the 70-foot-high Complexe Multi-Sport in Montreal. The engineer, architect, and design/build mechanical contractor were faced with the tough task of bringing indoor air comfort to the soccer players and 1,500 spectators on a regulation-sized (200×300-foot) soccer field via ductwork more than 70 feet above the pitch.
The solution was lightweight, blue TufTe fabric duct by DuctSox. Mechanical contractor Ventilabec of Laval, Que., and the HVAC manufacturer's representative Solutions Energetiques Enerconcept of Magog, Que., specified the premium-grade fabric duct to assure that players would receive the same indoor air comfort as the spectators on the perimeter, where the ductwork is only 15–25 feet above the ground.
To achieve the air diversity of reaching the players but not creating drafts on spectators, DuctSox factory-engineered half-inch and one-inch diffusion holes on both ends of the five 248-foot-long runs of 34-inch-diameter fabric ducts that loom over the spectator seats surrounding the field. As the duct climbs along curved wooden beams, the diffusion holes are graduated from 1½ inches to 2½ inches in diameter to create longer throws of air down to the field.
"We did tests and were happy to find the temperature differential between the ceiling and the 68-degree playing field was surprisingly only five degrees," said Eric LeClair, mechanical designer for Ventilabec.
LeClair was initially worried about the air-balancing capabilities of fabric ducts. "DuctSox guaranteed from the start that the diffuser holes and the cfm versus the air pressure would provide the exact air speed needed to reach the players on the field," he added. "It did."
DuctSox
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Historic Building Gets Oil-Free Chillers
For the redevelopment of the 1920s Acacia Court Building in Stockton, Calif., Grupe Commercial Co. desired quiet, energy-efficient chillers. Grupe specified McQuay frictionless chillers, which feature oil-free, magnetic-bearing compressor technology that eliminates metal-to-metal contact noise of conventional bearings. The chillers use just 0.62 kW/ton (32% less than traditional screw compressor chillers).
McQuay International
Input No. 256 at BDCnetwork.com/quickResponse
IRS has It Covered
Searching for a column cover that could withstand the harsh desert climate for the new IRS Building in Las Vegas, architect Bob Bingham of HFTA Architects, Irvine, Calif., turned to Pittcon Industries. The concern was the expansion and contraction of seven 36-inch-diameter, 57-foot-tall column enclosures at the front of the building. Bingham specified Pittcon's column cover system because it expands and contracts both horizontally and vertically.
Pittcon Industries
Input No. 252 at BDCnetwork.com/quickResponse
AIA Convention 2006
June 8–10, Los Angeles Convention Center, Los Angeles
Three of the industry's most recognized architects will kick off the AIA Convention 2006 with discussion of their recent work in Los Angeles. Frank Gehry (Walt Disney Concert Hall), Arata Isozaki (Museum of Contemporary Art), and José Rafael Moneo (Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels) will discuss their latest work and what the future holds for the City of Angels. The show will offer 150 continuing education programs, 100 professional tours, and 75 special events, as well as more than 800 exhibitors. www.aiaconvention.com
Church Takes Matters into Its Own Hands—Literally
Faced with a tight budget for the construction of its new church, officials at the Crest Baptist Church in Creston, Iowa, decided on a steel building to minimize the cost of the facility while maximizing the square footage of usable space. The parishioners, however, were not entirely happy with that plan: They wanted the church to have some type of masonry exterior to set off the steel finish. That's when the project architect, Dave Laugerman of Laugerman Architects, Des Moines, turned to Moderra Mortarless Masonry Veneers. Laugerman liked the system because it was a cost-effective alternative to mortared masonry and it was easy to install. In fact, installation was so simple that the parishioners opted to do the 7,000-sf job themselves.
GLS Industries Inc.
Input No. 254 at BDCnetwork.com/quickResponse
Auto Research Center Uses Integrated Fire Prevention
The BMW Information Technology Research Center at Clemson University, Greenville, S.C., needed a fire-safety control panel that could monitor and manage a complex system that includes two Orion air sampling systems, a CO2 system, two pre-action panels, an air-handling unit, three remote power supplies, fire shutters, and smoke curtains. All system functions are monitored by the MS-9600 control panel, which has a capacity of 318 addressable devices on one circuit, expandable to 636 devices.
Fire-Lite
Input No. 254 at BDCnetwork.com/quickResponse
Converted Factory Gets an Efficient, Slender Elevator
Fifth Avenue Station, a restored, turn-of-the-century furniture factory in downtown Naperville, Ill., needed an elevator installed after its conversion to a mixed-use complex of 127 apartments and 130,000 sf of retail and office space. The EcoSpace elevator from KONE is a nonhydraulic system that has no need for a machine room to take up prime building space. There is no hydraulic pump, so it creates no oil smell or environmental risk. It fit perfectly into building's old, narrow elevator shaft and gave the complex a modern, fast elevator. The elevator also uses 60% less energy than a hydraulic elevator.
KONE
Input No. 255 at BDCnetwork.com/quickResponse