A Pittsburgh area university approached Unistrut Service for design and materials assistance with a ceiling grid installation for a remodeled art gallery. A lack of storage space for construction materials and a desire to keep the facility open during the renovation complicated this project. On top of that, if our team did the installation, we’d be visiting 5 or 6 times over several weeks, and these additional travel expenses would have pushed the project over budget. All of these considerations made this project ideal for our Design and Material Program.
Our first step was to create the design concept. The university architect had a rough drawing, but several details did not work due to undersized anchors, oversized bolts, and fittings that were for a different Unistrut series, all which would have proved gravely troublesome if the job was installed per bid documents. Our Unistrut ceiling grid was also designed to accommodate the gallery’s high ceilings and to minimize vibration from adjacent areas.
Next, we created a complete bill of materials and phased delivery of the Unistrut materials to minimize storage issues. Each shipment contained palletized loads with just enough feet of P1000, P1001, threaded rod and P1031, P1028 and P1036 (among other parts) to complete one room in the gallery because they could only bring a few days worth of materials in at a time. The specific nature of our grid design and the flexible delivery schedule for materials suited the university’s needs perfectly.
On-site installation could be managed with confidence by the GC at the gallery. His installers coordinated daily with his drywall crew to ensure an efficient process. After the drywall was up, the install crew finished up the grids, allowing the other trades to complete their work. Having a daily presence with the carpenter crew onsite allowed for a trouble-free ceiling grid installation.
Well-engineered drawings, custom cut-to-length material and a phased, room-by-room approach to shipment eliminated guesswork and costly delays, making completion of this project a breeze. Feel confident in the most challenging of conditions or construction timelines with our Design and Material Program – it was a work of art for this customer’s gallery, and USCO can create a solution for your project as well.