Better, stronger, faster our versa core panels they’re one of the strongest panels, one of the lightest panels, and one of the highest insulated panels on the market. So to be light, strong, and highly insulated all at the same time it sounds like it’s too good to be true but that’s what we’re making and thats what we’re selling. So when it came time for one developer to expand in record time they called Fabcon. This is building one over here and now it’s on to building two. What would normally take months can now be done in a fraction of the time with versacore precast panels. This project has about 300 panels to be placed on it, its going to take us about three weeks to finish this project.
One of the big advantages of Fabcon is the speed of erection and the economics of putting the panels in. If you were doing a building out of masonry per se you’d have probably four or five times the number of manpower on the job. Typically we only need eight people to install panels on our project. The engineering behind each panel and their load-bearing ability make these panels a necessity when you need to aim high. We have the capacity in terms of load-bearing to build really high panels so people who are in the fulfillment and distribution business who need to have a lot of clear height space our panels can be engineered to support the roof span that’s needed for those large facilities and we create a larger footprint inside because there’s less structural steel. [Music] A Versacore panel is not just free cast concrete it’s also pre-stressed concrete. What that means is we’re running pre-stressed cables throughout the panel and each of those cables is under a great amount of tension.
If you want to think about our wall as a bunch of little Jenga blocks stacked up you can imagine if I put one on top of the other I could eventually make something that looks like a versacore wall panel. But if I pushed on the Jenga blocks they would just burst open right? But if I take that same statute and I wrap them in rubber bands now you can imagine if I push on the on the Jenga blocks they may spring open but if I relieve the pressure they’ll spring back in place. And the prestressing cables inside the panels do the same thing, they allow us to make panels that are in excess of 60 feet in length while still only being 8 inches thick. It’s a much more durable panel it’s also much stronger for its weight than just conventional concrete, reinforced concrete. The panels behind me here these are panels that we just installed this morning. You’ll see you can still see the joints between the panels. We have a caulking pro that starts typically a day or two after we begin erecting the panel we’ll talk in those seams as we install and we place a brace on the panel the temporary put them in place.
He’s currently welding some of the connections that tie the panels together but its an efficient process we complete all that welding as we erect every day. So that it’s a streamlined process, as we’re erecting the building we complete all our work as we’re going. Fabcon can customize every versacore panel to include window and door openings something that’s not previously available to contractors. You’ll see we’re looking at some of the openings we cast into the panels. These are based on how the architect wants to lay the building out, where they want their doctor locations, and clerestory windows for laid into the building. They’ll give us detailed architectural drawings we produce shop drawings that locate those openings where they want them in the building and we cast them where they want them in the project. And what you will see there’s some little stems on those openings are actually larger dock doors for trucks to back up.
A constant commitment to advancements in technology meant Versacore went from a hollow core to a foam one. We take recycled foam and the recycle foam goes into the billets and the billets actually get placed into our Versacore product which increases the r-value of a product. In fact it’s not just the foam this recycle we actually recycle the steel if you look at the steel and the foam and the other components that we actually recycle and put into to the versa core product up to 58 percent of materials that we use for this recycled material. But what are the guys on the job think about the lighter panels? Do you think if this wall was blocked you know and what they’d have to do to set up scaling and how many guys they have to have you know and and then to be able to have this where it’s one step in the insulation the finish everything’s done. I think that’s why they’re leading the market. Staying in line with their commitment to less waste Fabcon customizes every panel to each specific project. Each panel is a custom panel, so we don’t produce anything to stock. They are cast in one continuous pour and then cut to length later. Like 30,000 pound lego building blocks these panels can be taken down and reconfigured into new buildings using a unique numbering system.
One example we have here in the cities recently was a large retail distribution center that was doing an addition to their building. There were a few hundred feet of wall panels that didn’t fit the structural requirements of the new building. So in this case rather than taking the precast down and disposing of it the general contractor came up with the idea originally cooperation between our engineer, the architect, and those sales were actually taken down and repurposed to build a catholic school in a small Southwest Minnesota town. Now that’s sustainable! So what gives Versacore the leading edge? We make it in the factory we ship it and we put it up all ourselves it’s all under one roof start to finish. But the benefits don’t stop there. It holds the roof up it holds the wind out, it reads this in seismic condition, that resists fire events things like that but it also has the insulation in it for the energy efficiency. With so many choices and color variations the design options are endless. We’re standing in front of the Fabcon precast sample wall at the savage location in Minnesota. This is just a small section of the variety of panels that we can produce. You can see just by glancing across the wall there’s a very large range of color options.
There is a lot of science behind it. [Music] What they’re doing is you’re going to and picking panels and prepping them to go under a truck to a job site. Every panel you see out here has a job number and a part number for where it goes on a specific project. Each job has a you know eighty ninety couple hundred panels and they all unique and specifically drawn and produced. We have a mobile tracking system so all our ground guys have tablets in their hands and as a panels come off the bed they input by a number so specific location in the yard that they’re located. Fabcon’s comes commitment to their buildings last long after they leave the jobs site. These buildings are going to be around a long time they’re gonna be here long past anybody that works here now and it’s nice to know or a comfort to the customer that whoever they pass their business on to their heirs you’re a different business well that sort of thing that Fabcon is going to be here to help them care for that building, to meet their future needs, and to do whatever modifications, additions, expansions whatever that they need.
