Dr Daniel Hale Williams Rock County Resource Center

Rock County purchased a vacant grocery store to convert into their County Community Services building. Seven different divisions will be housed in the new office space that will include 500 new offices.

Rock County had a firm move in date. With a very large staff count, a target move in date was key for the client to organize and coordinate a large move for a corporate headquarters.

JP Cullen utilized our in-house BIM department to model interior walls as prefabricated wall panels. In all, JP Cullen was able to prefabricate about 730 interior steel stud wall panels and self-perform all remaining framing on the interior and exterior of the building. To further increase our bench strength and grow our employees, carpenter apprentices were teamed up with a foreman who was experienced in prefabricated wall panels. He taught them the tips and tricks to build quality panels quickly. The apprentices perfected their technique and broke the previously held record of 72 walls per day and raised the bar to 76 walls per day.

Sequencing also played a large role in helping crews complete the project in an efficient manner and work to finish areas of the building quicker. The original plan was to demo the entire existing floor to install underground piping. The team proposed the plan to the client to only cut and trench the concrete in the areas where underground piping was to be installed to which the client agreed would be the most efficient. Our team sequenced the work and sectioned the building off in to seven different areas. By sequencing the areas, the team was able to use this sequence to order materials by area and reduce the amount of material congestion onsite at any given time. Using prefabrication, crews were able to split into groups and work on different operations simultaneously. While sections were being demoed, other crews were building wall panels, so they were ready to be set as soon as demo was complete in that area. Typically, the crew would have to wait until demo was finished to begin any work for that area, but prefabrication allows work to happen ahead of time or in parallel with other activities.

Prefabrication enables us to cut down on material waste by using BIM generated drawings to order material. With the custom wall panel drawings and material take off, we were able to determine exact lengths of materials needed for our wall panels. The job team then ordered their material in custom lengths, cut by the manufacture, to reduce material waste and cut time required onsite. Ultimately, our team saved roughly 15% on material waste.

Using prefabrication JP Cullen was able to save the client $13,000 and two weeks on schedule, ultimately allowing their staff to move in sooner than anticipated.