A crane lowers material into the new Sharon Tube storage facility in Sharon, Pa.
When Zekelman Industries, one of the largest independent steel pipe and tube manufacturers in North America, needed to expand and upgrade its storage facility at its Sharon Tube plant in Sharon, Pa., CEC answered the call.
CEC is providing engineering for structural and foundation design, as well as architectural drawings for the expansion and upgrade. The building, an extension of the plant’s main building, is expected to be completed by the end of 2024. It should be fully operational in 2025.
Automated Storage System for Increased Efficiency
In addition to Sharon Tube, Zekelman Industries’ other companies include Wheatland Tube, Atlas Tube, Picoma, Western Tube, Z Modular, and Hayes Modular. The companies produce a variety of products including standard and fire sprinkler pipe, galvanized mechanical tubing, and fence framework, Precision Drawn Over Mandrel (DOM) tubing, steel and aluminum electrical conduit, galvanized steel and aluminum elbows, couplings and nipples.
The new storage Sharon facility will house an automated pipe/tube rack storage system. As the tubing is produced in the plant’s main building, it will be added to the inventory in the storage facility, and as products are scheduled for delivery, they will be shipped. The storage bays are continually rebalanced, as it’s a constant flow of materials in and out of the warehouse with no humans required in the building. The touchless product handling enabled by these automated systems significantly increases safety, as well as shipping capacity.
Rick Hans, Senior Director of Engineering for Sharon Tube and Wheatland Tube, says CEC was recommended a few years ago for a similar project requiring design with structural tube and developed an understanding of Zekelman’s design requirements. Hans is responsible for managing the company’s strategic capital projects. He says this type of project is fairly new in the United States, with several similar warehouse systems currently operating in Italy.
Tackling the storage facility project for CEC are Debbie Lagamba, Senior Project Manager; Matthew Lee, Structural Group Manager; and Brayden Behanna, Structural Designer, all of whom are in CEC’s Manufacturing Infrastructure Services Group.
“This is the second project on which Debbie and I have worked,” Hans says. “She is very professional and organized and has been helpful facilitating our combined team interactions. Matt has been an important team member, and he and his design team have worked well with our equipment designer, fabricator, and general contractor.”
Effective Communication Key to Project Success
Lagamba stressed the importance of the interface with the Zekelman engineers on the endeavor, as well as the field support with the contractors on site.
“Communication is the key to any successful project. When project stakeholders are aligned from the start and regularly scheduled team meetings take place throughout all project phases, interface errors and costly field modifications can be avoided to help maintain the client’s budget and project schedule. Since much of the infrastructure and process engineering design was performed in parallel, document control, organization, and transmission of electronic files were key factors to ensure all parties were working and communicating with the latest information. It’s been a true team effort to design this project in Sharon.”
The project presented a unique opportunity for CEC to expand its capabilities as the design required the utilization of the Atlas Hollow Structural Sections (HSS) tubing produced by Zekelman’s own Atlas Tube company for the main structural racking elements within the Sharon storage facility.
“We used 100% steel tubing in the design,” commented Lee. “We are working with what they produce as the standard size — Atlas jumbo tube — so there’s no need for special orders as construction progresses.”
Ongoing Support and Collaboration Throughout Construction
It’s been a true balancing act requiring countless hours of field support with the contractors. Lee said there have been at least two to three CEC team members working on this project over the course of the past year. While CEC has completed the engineering and design phase for the warehouse storage building, CEC services will continue, responding to contractor RFIs and performing steel submittal reviews as construction advances.
“It’s a good partnership,” Hans concludes.
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