Weeks 26-30 – 01 Sep – 07 Oct 12 – Holiday, training and that horrible “return to work” feeling
The dates of this blog seem to cover a long stretch but when you consider that the first 2 weeks I was on holiday and the third week I was on various training courses, it only leaves the last couple to write about!
For those interested, we had a nice break. We drove North through tropical North Queensland and saw many nice things. I will not bore anyone with the happy snaps.
Week 28 was when I finally completed some safety training with JHG; it should happen within the first few weeks but I guess that’s the way the GLNG MOF rolls! It was surprisingly good and because it was in Brisbane I was well looked after with flights, taxis and a particularly nice hotel in the city centre with a service called “charge-back”. I didn’t abuse it but it certainly puts JPA expenses to shame!
My holiday and courses resulted me being off the Island for 20 days straight and didn’t I know it when I returned. Having to get up again at 0400 was painful. What I was not surprised to see was that nothing had changed, apart from the wall leaning over.
The works programme had been extended by some 4 months and my immediate issues were to find some work for the civil crew to actually undertake. Unfortunately we failed to deliver and said a sad farewell to some of the workforce although they were only temps provided by a sub-contractor. Even so, it’s not a great feeling and rests heavily on you.
That said, things will pick up eventually and new work fronts are scheduled to come live soon…I just have to wait a bit longer…
Careful What You Wish For…
C4ISR
Oh crap – be careful what you wish for. We requested that the contractor clarifies every single aspect of his Request for Equitable Adjustment and boy did we get it. A giant box full evidence and exhibits to prove that he is owed just over $3M by the US Government. If you stack up the A4 double sided papers, they reach over 3 feet in height. This is the amount of paperwork that now needs to be sorted and appraised and with only three people to do this, a coordinated and concurrent method is required. Enter stage left, McFry’s patented analysis tools. A request is in with the tech guys to re-visit their first (failed) attempt at generating the network environment needed to host the tools securely. The case is also to be sent directly to the USACE District commander to see if he can add some weight to it. It is clear that I won’t be around to see this one put to bed before phase 3 but at least I can still shape the response and begin the evaluations.
The subsequent work will now all be used to generate a negotiation plan to find some middle ground. Many of the contractor’s claims are sheer faced cheek and others he is definitely in the right. The grey areas are the ones that will cause us concern and this is where the coordinated thought is required. Further help and advice will be required from the Lawyers at District to keep everything in context.
EDC Solarwall
Relationships have now completely broken down and what was once a harmonious working routine is now painful and fraught with challenges…….but not between USACE and the Contractor…the difficulty is between the Huntsville and Harrisburg offices. Huntsville conducted the scoping and wrote the contract before awarding the job. We are responsible for the local execution of the contract, but after finding a number of errors with the contract (some of which could put us in hot water in legal and financial terms), certain personnel at the Huntsville office have become quite ‘anti’ to say the least. Some examples are as follows:
DAVIS BACON WAGE RATES: The department of Labo(u)r regularly publishes minimum wage rates that vary by trade and geographical location. These are to be published in site offices so the workers can compare what they are being paid to what the law states they should be receiving. This is enforced by myself and the Construction Representative through employee interviews. I was asked to check that the rates in the contract were the correct rates for the time of signature on the contract, and I found they were not. Upon raising this to the Huntsville office they just replied that ‘it’s ok – they signed the contract so it’s legal.’ After a lot of asking around and researching more thoroughly – we don’t have a leg to stand on. They must change the rates and recompense the workers accordingly (and one of the trades has a $14/hour difference!). It took about six attempts at raising it and threats to raise it to the contracting Officer directly before anything was done about it. Since then, everything I’ve raised with the Huntsville office is met with combative responses and unhelpful jibes…..All I did was point out they’d made a mistake.
PAYROLL INFORMATION: In order to confirm the information in the wage interviews (see above) I need to see the actual payroll information so as to corroborate all the figures before I can give the nod to the Contracting Officer’s Representative to actually authorise payments. I included this information in the Pre-Construction meeting and the minutes and the contractor was more than happy to provide the information. For some reason Huntsville decided that only the Contracting Officer needed this info and ordered the contractor not to send it to me or the ConRep. Long story short – we couldn’t approve the pay application and the contractor was not paid on time (Through no fault of his own I might add). There then ensued another protracted bout of quoting clauses from the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) before I finally had to spell out (and I was very pleased with this) exactly how and why we needed the info and exactly where in the FAR it states our case. The person who takes pride in reminding everyone that they are a ‘contracting specialist’ had to accede. All in all this was a painful and time consuming process which was ultimately very unproductive in terms of project progress….so I had to raise it higher.
THE MOTHER CONTRACT: Another long one shortened – we asked for the mother contract and we were told we didn’t need it. After questioning how we are expected to execute the contract without an actual copy of the contract we still had no joy. Had to find an alternative friendly forces within Huntsville to obtain it. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see why this is not good. After seeking advice on the actual contract itself the response was a resounding ‘that’s a bit thin’ and ‘that would never have made it past first draft at District’. Having compared it to other contracts I also see how they achieve economy of effort by simple referring to FAR clauses instead of actually using them in the contract. It also appears though that they don’t read the clauses they quote!
1413 – CONTRACTOR INDEMNITIES AND INSURANCES: Again a pissing competition over why the Harrisburg Office is demanding certain procedures to be undertaken (because it’s the law) and Huntsville claim they never have to do them. More highlighter pen all over the FAR to prove our procedures aren’t just made up resulted in more blunt silences from the Huntsville crew.
Conclusion – the Huntsville team are more accustomed to working with service contracts where many of the issues we highlighted to them are never needed. There are some whacking great holes in the contract and now the contractor is aware of them. I feel another Request for Equitable Adjustment coming on…..and a headache. The working relationship between the offices is less than productive and severely unhealthy for the project. I put my thoughts down in a report for my boss to argue out with them. It came very close to us just pulling the plug all together and giving the whole thing back to Huntsville to figure out….and it’s a long drive from Alabama.
On the work front I had to issue a letter of concern about progress – the rate of work doesn’t match with the schedule. I’m not overly worried though because they are getting faster all the time as they get used to the procedures and materials. They also have no concurrent activity in the schedule and there is loads of scope to crash the programme.
Albright Avenue Closure Repair
This was a great opportunity to look at the levee systems and how the gate closures are designed. At the Albright location it was found that an error in construction drawings made it past the checking phase. (Design was good – drawing was clearly cut and pasted and tweaked badly). The finished product is a flood protection gate that floats…..even a PET student can see the irony in that. Work covered an appraisal of whether the choice of gate was correct, reason why it happened the way it did, how likely a significant flood event is (statistically) and what short term and long term fixes we can offer….. The result of my statistical analysis was that we are already late for the next significant event and that the latest it is likely to happen is August 2013. Since the report was finished we have the small issue of Hurricane Sandy rapidly approaching our doorstep…..it’s obviously sheer coincidence, but I hope they got the memo.
Neil – some pics I owe you…
Other News
The Embassy called me in to attend compulsory briefings in Washington DC in relation to Army 2020, MS briefs and the role and agenda for liaison officers and exchange officers. Not being entirely sure how an engineering exchange officer fits into the same category as an LO or EO I was still keen to attend just to feel like I’m part of the Army still. Ben wasn’t on the distribution so I subtly snitched on him (with his consent) and it was nice to catch up in DC. Also met Major Wayne Meek (PQE) who is working in Alabama (or the like), I completely ‘dissed’ the old CRE (Now General Le-Gris) by having one of those “you look familiar” moments (thanks Ben for rescuing me) and I also bumped into Major Rich Reese and Colonel Charlie Thackway – other Engineers from my past. So all in all – a very nice re-union…..depending on who you ask.
Just a thought – is it worth giving the next round of PQE attachment folk access to the blog so they can see the exploits and experiences so far? Either way – can someone please pass on mine and Ben’s e-mail addresses to Nick? I’m sure we’d both be happy to start comms now if he has any questions at all. The Ausie folks may also have some good early pointers?
Hurricane Sandy is reportedly going to smash the East coast within the next 24 hours. We have all been placed on a state of emergency and have been told to expect to be without electricity and running water for days. I have set up a basher in the bushes and have been stockpiling beer for days. Ulli on the other hand is due to fly to Germany on Monday night – so this could all turn into ging-gang at the airport. Walmart is sold out of batteries and flash lights and I have essentially been out and purchased a big pile of stuff that I actually already own in storage back in the UK.
Really sick of the elections…..please kill me…. – oops, almost forgot – be careful what you wish for right? See you after the storm.
“It’s all good to go”
“It’s all good to go”: Magnus B Crane Changeout
The replacement of Magnus’ B Crane was one of Ish’s major projects, and handed to me “all good to go” following two Value Systems Analysis meetings with the key stakeholders and an external agency who were brought in to facilitate it. The first was to investigate what weighting should be applied to four considerations that between them would be used in ranking methods of the B Crane change out. This was done by rating the importance of one factor against another and saying if it stronger, much stronger or very much stronger than the other. The outcome of this was more extreme than expected and showed that there was a 62% weighting towards (not) impacting operations, 22% towards constructability, 12% to the importance of having a straightforward implementation, and just 4% to minimising the cost. In my eyes the absence of anyone from the business side of things was highly influential on the outcome that suggested “quick and straightforward at any cost”.
In the second meeting had a few more key players: Gav from Renewals whose opening line was “So, is this where we confirm its an HLV then?” and Tamara from the financial side who was amused to see that the real cost had such a low influence. The next part of the meeting compared the different methods of crane changeout based on very few hard facts; essentially peoples’ opinions based on what they’d seen/heard in the past. Even more interestingly, we compared two named stick-builds (Sparrows and LBO, who all had supplied facts and figures) with three notional ideas of how a Heavy Lift Vessel would work, rather than named HLV vessels themselves. Funny old thing, the notional HLV came out on top, despite none of us having a real idea of what the implications are.
A week after Ish left we got Ian Alexander from Sparrows (our preferred bidder for lifting operations) in to discuss how they have worked with HLV crane installations in the past (bearing in mind the lowering speed can be 0.5 m/s there are some impact forces to mitigate against, amongst other things). They gave us an excellent presentation on their enabling works with the HLV Saipem on the Captain platform. In this instance the ‘super-fast HLV method’ required a total of 11 weeks work from start to finish due to all the other works required, such as moving some items on the platform (the HLV had a 2m “obstruction-free” zone), jacking up the crane that was being removed, and shutting down the platform as must be done for all HLV work. This has made us re-think the HLV option, although having spoken to Herema today (and also Ish), they have a much lower requirement for enabling works. The problem I now have, is finding the best solution based on some maybe flawed parameters, and then convincing everyone that I still have the best option by all accounts. To give rough figures, the full cost of an HLV is estimated as £15-20m; a Sparrows stickbuild will be £7-10m.
What I’ve really learnt from this is the seemingly obvious reiteration of three important things:
- Have hard facts and figures for all options when doing any kind of comparative analysis.
- Ensure key stakeholders are present at meetings that affect decisions where options can have £10m difference.
- Always remember Rule number one.
Figure 1. Saipem being used to install an entire platofrm. Is it overkill to use an HLV for a single crane?
Other jobs
ETAP ALQ. My Appraise report is nearly complete and having convinced my programme manager that we need to look at more POB, I have a feeling we may be asked more than the 30 originally planned for. To get the Area Operations Manager to attend my gate meeting I was given two windows this side of Christmas, but as I have found, I don’t want to make any decisions without the big-guns verifying it, so I have a date and time set. The go-ahead (looking at £15m for 40 POB) will be based on a business case that I’ve been told to not concern myself with, so all I need to worry about is the engineering of it. This will be an excellent job for my successor to carry on with the Define and onshore Execute of. The offshore Execute will be Summer 2014.
Magnus TAR jobs (5 of). These are all running OK, with the work on three of them being split to minimise the work done inside of the TAR so it can be completed after (outside of the time when a day equates to roughly £2m in lost revenue). My concern is that the work will be delayed so I am fighting to get buy-in from the platform for the project POB afterwards. The one that this is unlikely to be the case on is the Decommissioning work – there is loads more than expected (looking at <300 different parts of pipework post-TAR) and that is a lot of work: something like 300 man-weeks in the latest estimate! This non-TAR work will be surveyed in Jan and Feb so we should know more then.
And in other news.
I’ve hung up my running shoes for the year, having finished 4th (from 196 starts) in the 60-mile London to Brighton race, and 12th (from 150) in the Glencoe Marathon (gutted – was 2nd for the first 8 miles but piled in as soon as we started running downhill). Liz also did Glencoe and did amazingly, despite cutting her knee nicely in the first mile. Nearly £1000 raised for Combat Stress and the Muirhouse Youth Development Trust so that’s good.
Dougal is awesome but hard work – Roy Serevena, I really don’t know how you managed with all those dogs and children: Lisa must be a legend!
Figure 2. Dougal
Winter tyres are ordered and get fitted next week: it was -4 as I drove in last week (admittedly this was at 0500 hrs…). Perhaps a little cooler than things Down Under, but looks good for the winter climbing season!
Client, Contractors & Catastrophic Failures
SURFACE WORKS
Piling
CFA and CMC piling continues, as does rectification works for non-conformance reports (NCRs) (raised by Crossrail and subsequently Vinci and the sub-contractor upon realisation that it is commercially advantageous to flag up your own defects) on 1200 out of 1800 CMC piles. The principal cause of these defects was the use of a crack inducer that had not previously been trialled on this scale. The plastic yellow cone pictured contains a wooden ball which, when filled with grout at high pressure from above acts as a non-return valve forcing the grout out through the sides and hence inducing a crack in the pile. The induced crack, combined with the use of an excavator to crop the piles proved highly ineffective and was eventually replaced by a pile cropper. A 67% defect rate has proved extremely costly, and unfortunately for the sub-contractor and Vinci, unlike the first few piles which disappeared into the river terrace deposits, these NCRs cannot be attributed to unforeseeable ground conditions.
Those rectified CMC piles that have now been accepted by the Client have subsequently been overlain with the Loading Transfer Platform (LTP) and Load Tested in preparation for the reinforced track slab works. There have generally not been any problems with the CFA piles, which have been cut off exposing the starter bars in preparation for the track slab walls and overhead cables.
Reinforced Concrete Delivery
The Vinci delivered reinforced concrete track slab and walls are awaiting final ‘acceptance’ from Crossrail, and a trial has been carried out to refine methodology prior to works commencing. Making good trials will follow to establish best practice for the main works. With a large amount of concreting starting on site (and within the tunnel), Vinci engineers have been receiving in-house training to in order to be able to carry out re-bar and pre and post-pour concrete inspections.
TUNNEL
Temporary Services
Temporary Services have now been 90% installed, partially handed over and the sub-contractor is now in contract in a maintenance contract. Having seen a sub-contract ‘almost’ full circle my main observations and lessons learnt are as follows:
Sufficient time and resources (the right people) should be spent drawing up the scope and specifications – what will be needed during construction (what will be the maximum capacity + contingency) and for final handover (ability to reduce capacity for the Client)? E.g. Having to issue 6 x PMIs for additional power requirements.
Planning should be continuous and communicated to the right people – how will other works interact with the installation, during and after construction. E.g. The Invert Replacement Trial required 4 x M&E services to be moved and the props and temporary works for the main works conflict with the fire main, compressed air line and drainage pipe.
And finally…. Final handover is extremely difficult! The longer it takes to sign and accept the works, the longer any defects have to appear and the longer the risk remains assigned somebody else! Not forgetting the difficulty in achieving the requisite level of quality.
However, I also accept that hindsight is a great thing and issues and snags often only become apparent during or after the work. And time = money at the start of the project, in the same way that time = money during and after the project. I would still argue however, that time (and money) spent in planning is seldom wasted, provided of course there is sufficient information to plan with…..which in this case may by a significant contributing factor!
On the issue of money, at an average of £100k a month to discharge water in the sewers either side of the tunnel, a re-design (including a filtration system) is now underway to construct a drainage system that discharges water from a central sump into the docks…… hence negating the requirement for 200m of pipe line and £500k in Thames Water bills….maybe that’s why they chose to do it like that in the 1890?!
Drilling & Grouting Works
Drilling suffered a further setback after high water pressures hampered the insertion of plastic TaMs, despite the additional contact grouting directly behind the tunnel lining. The design was reviewed and sacrificial steel TaMs with a conical end will be used, which can be drilled into the gravels allowing the micro-fine grout to permeate directly into the gravels.
In-Tunnel Well Points
Localised dewatering was to be provided by well points drilled at 10m intervals, 4m below the invert into the Lambeth Group. All were found to be dry, however, in the event of any water entering the wells, a passive pumping system will be installed.
Invert Replacement
Prior to the replacement of the concrete invert, two 1.8m trail bays were required in order test the methodology and monitor the loads induced in the props as a result of the excavation. The trial got off to a bad start when a fully charged cast iron pipe (part of the original construction temporary drainage, but fortunately for Vinci and the subbies not marked on any drawings – good ol’ Clause 61!) was hit causing water inflow at a rate of approx 50l/s. A packer was eventually connected and 1000l of grout solved the problem 3 days later (the delay was a result of a drawn out Client decision to grant permission to break open the pipe for fear of inundation – despite not being able to stop the flow without opening up the pipe)!
Pipe fixed, reinforcement installed and concrete poured. All that remains now is a prolonged battle between the Client and the Contractor regarding permissible bay widths and size of props for the main works. The Client arguing that whilst the loading in the props was monitored to be less than 2% of the actual capacity (less than the differential caused by thermal expansion and contraction), and that the tunnel, whilst extremely strong will act as a brittle structure and if failure does occur it will be catastrophic. The Contractor on the other hand is using the prop load data, combined with an independent consultants report arguing that the Ko used by the Client is far too conservative to allow for a feasible and cost effective methodology……
….in the mean time….. Central Box Construction through the Twin Tunnel, Cofferdam preparations and newly appointed Instrumentation, Monitoring and Dewatering Manager…. (I would recommend avoiding flying from London City Airport during my tenure!)
Type quickly – it’s Friday Afternoon!
C4ISR
Discussions with schedule specialist show little opportunity for progress without further input from contractor who has now requested another 3 week extension. The Office Engineer is adamant that if they delay any further that he will throw the whole thing out. I am skeptical that he has the authority to do so, however. My understanding is that under the Federal Acquisition Regulations, if the contractor is owed money he has the right to pursue it. I take the OE’s rants with a pinch of salt.
An additional submission from sub contractor for further adjustment has been received and has hit $1.5M – bringing total claim to $3M. This is a Big No No – as essentially it is asking the sub-contractor to do business directly with the Client. I have asked that the Prime certifies the request, but am curious as to whether or not they will – as I believe the sub has been ripping off the Prime. Main contractor must sign off on it before we can do anything with it…..it’s getting bigger!
ECIP Lighting Projects
Sat in on meetings reference energy savings produced from ongoing lighting project. Monitoring shows that project should pay for itself within 5 years…..just in time for the buildings to be de-commissioned!
Ashley Reservist Centre
Joy of joys – this is coming to an amicable solution. The petrographic testing has shown that in essence the concrete on the loading ramps is sound and therefore all of the problems witnessed on site should be able to be resolved using cosmetic upgrades….or so I thought. Subsequent concrete break strength tests (taken from other areas) are now showing that three quarters of the most recent test results are below strength. Why won’t this project die!?!? So we now have the Corps lab saying it’s too weak, the batch plant tests saying it’s fine and the independent lab tests (which have been accused by the corps lab of falsifying results) also saying they are fine. Additional testing from the independent lab is inbound soon and a decision will be made by the Contracting Officer’s Representative as to whether we pursue this further.
EDC Solarwall
I am still rattling the head of security to provide workable policy instead of just putting up barriers and being awkward. I ended up writing a policy which has now been adopted temporarily until they write a more comprehensive one (which I’m told may look very familiar when it comes back) but now we’re having bun fights about how staff are processed for security checking to actually get them on site now. Having upset the head of security a little more publicly this time I don’t think I’ll be taken for a ride-along in a police car any time soon.
Having extrapolated current progress on the wall against the various schedule items I see we are about to start slipping behind on schedule. Ordinarily I would prepare a letter of concern, but seeing as this contractor has been excellent at turning things around (and I see plenty of potential for concurrent activity etc) I saw no reason to escalate so quickly. I wrote a formal letter asking them to simply explain their plans for the COR to reassure him that we have no reason to worry. The COR likes the verbiage and intends to use this approach on other projects before slapping their wrists with the letter of concern. It’s more of a friendly prod while relationships are all still good……and there aren’t many of those around here! I intend to keep it that way as long I we can.
The Department of Labor issues minimum wage rates for various skilled laborers and these get updated quite regularly. It was noticed that the rates that are being used do not match the department of labour rates for the time the contract was signed. This means an administrative modification is required to the contract. Problem 1 is that the mistake was made by another office and must be rectified by the other office. The staff there seem not only unwilling to bring it to the attention of the Contracting Officer but also slightly confused as to why I’m banging a drum about it. (It falls to this office to do the pay interviews etc and we’ll have the fun of fixing it.) Problem 2 is that the rates themselves appear to vary quite badly, meaning there’s a strong chance we will need more federal funding to make sure the workers are paid their dues. More fun to follow.
Having fun with review of wind calcs and seismic loading calcs!
Am reviewing submittal of pay requests and processing them but keep finding that info is missing (but probably sent to the wrong government office). This is bad because the contractor appears to have two masters (a design centre and a construction centre) and neither are on the same page. This whole concept looked great on paper! I also find that we are re-learning the same mistakes over again form the last ‘joint’ venture.
Albright Avenue Closure Repair
This is a new involvement fro me on a levee project where the USACE designed a rolling flood gate…..which appears to float in the event of flooding! All just in time for a TMR. Site visits and historical data collection abounds.
Other News
Was nice to spend some time back in UK with family as my father is not too well. Typically my wife ended up in hospital in the USA while I was in the UK. Impeccable timing you could say. Thankfully all is well. Just as well as owe don’t have any life insurance on her.
The political machines are in full spin cycle in the run up to the elections. I’m pretty sure our voting cards that came through were sent by mistake.
I have developed a habit of seeing things in the shared calendar and inviting myself along…..which then turn out to be the commander’s visits. He doesn’t seem to mind. Most recently was a visit to Poplar Island – a man-made habitat for wildlife made up of dredge material from the Chesapeake bay. I’m keeping my eyes open to see if he’s hosting cocktails – see how far I can push this.
Stay safe y’all
Gas regulator indoors?
Hey everyone. Has anyone ever come across a gas regulator indoors?
This one will soon have an AHU just below it that supplies air to an industrial kitchen. Is it even legitimate to have the regulator in an enclosed space? They work by venting gas to atmosphere – which in a plant room seems like a bad idea. The reason I’m worrying about it is that the Consultant, no stranger to a Spanish practice, says not to worry about it. Are the quantities of gas these things put out so small that it isn’t a problem?
I’ll dig out the Australian Standard, but if anyone has seen this before I’d be grateful for a heads up.
It’s been a quick summer
A really quick summer!
It seems that every day which passes picks up speed, and I can’t believe that we are already in mid September.
My time is still split between the two major projects here of the Steam Sterilisation plant and the USAMRIID replacement project.
I am now mostly involves in the commissioning process of the USAMRIID. In the building about 60% of the space is mechanical “room” jam-packed with HEPA filters, air handling units, control systems, compressors, pumps and everything else you could possibly think of.
I am managing the commissioning contractors issue log, this involves answering any questions they have on any of the many systems, in order to allow them to write the system tests that will accurately test and check the equipment, and put it through its paces. Some of these questions then highlight further problems which had not been previously considered, and thus I find myself researching a variety of systems and also going back to the original designer, (who will still have on contract) with a set of further developed questions, this is then resulting in some changes to the specification.
I have become the USACE lead on the in-the-field testing of some of the systems, ensuing that the quality of workmanship is up to the extremely high standard required. As part of this I have found that one set of tests being conducted may have been recurrently inaccurate for a couple of years, which is clearly a concern, as retesting would be extremely expensive and in many areas near impossible. I am attempting to determine the exact level of fault and from there find a quick/easy solution, and subsequently implement a system which will not allow the similar problems to recur.
In the Steam Sterilization Plant things are still fairly static. The higher management within USACE and the Lead Contractor are conducting a very slow negotiation over the final change, as they have been for the past 3 months. The Contractors bid is slowly falling from $2m to $1.6m but still not close to the expected $300K.
There are also systems tests of the SSP which remain failed/incomplete, and also pivotal for the plant to be finally commissioned by the Centre for Disease Control. Again due to the impasse and a hard stop on any further funding from us, getting remedial work and a retest is not currently possible, thus in order to progress we are having to conduct in depth research to determine if the previous test failure can be explained in a way that will not cause a huge rework. I have been in discussion with various laboratories in the US to compare their testing procedures with ours, to ensure we were not including an overly large safety margin. If the SSP continues to sit in deadlock for many more months then it will begin to impact the critical path of the USAMRIID project, and thus huge pressure will mount.
On the home front
Sarah has been working in a HR recruitment company for the past 6 weeks, and is now getting over her horror at the employment laws out here (until recently an employer was well within their rights to ask for your Facebook username and password, and you could be fired for not providing them). She seems to spend most of her day interviewing Ex-Cons who need work, so an eye-opener all round.
My beer is going well; I have now brewed a Belgian Ale, Weisbeer, IPA, Dupple and Pilsner all of which are actually pretty good! (Much to Sarah’s surprise)
We went on a road trip from here to Niagara Falls, the Great Lakes, Michigan and Pittsburgh. About 3000 miles in total: America is in fact quite big!
20 Sept 12. Post-summer update
IMechE competencies
Just a few notes on how am doing, as follows an impromptu chat in Runcorn earlier this week:
So I’m down there for some project review meetings for 4 of my jobs and Steve Kydd (the TAR Engineering Manager) has asked if he can join in with all our progress meetings, so he’s there too. Anyway, we’re having lunch and I’m asking him about his career so far (British Nuclear Fuels following Uni, and BP since 2006), and whether he’s chartered. And it turned out to be a winner of a question! Not only is he chartered through IMechE, he’s also a regular on the interview panel in Glasgow and would happily review my application form, be a sponsor, and fully rehearse an interview. How good is that?? Conversation moved on to the competencies, and before I could even suggest how he viewed my performance so far he was happy to tell me I’d blitz C-E without a doubt, but still need to work on A and B as that’s where all BP staff struggle, particularly the graduates [after 3-years with BP]. Something I guess I knew, but he told me not to stress just yet, but to be sure to review it post-Christmas – notably, this date fits into a quieter time in the pre-TAR work for the jobs I’ve got that are on his radar.
Later, at the airport, I asked whether there was much concern that a lad with 6-months in the trade was running so many of the TAR scopes (bearing in mind that one day of TAR roughly equates to £2m in lost revenue). “Oh yes Chris, that’s definitely something we’ve flagged up, but what you lack in experience and knowledge you more than make up for in energy, and that’s what we need from you.”
So OK, I clearly can’t bluff my engineering prowess just yet, but another person has said it will come with time. Oh, and they’d employ me if I ever fancied it…
Project Updates
ETAP ALQ. I’ve literally just rocked a meeting with the AESTL (Asset Engineering Services Team Leader) and one of the Renewals guys. They want it [Additional living Quarters], they probably want it bigger, but they don’t know when they want it. Compared to the costs of £200k a day for a flotel (they’re only using it for 120 beds, and I think they’re planning on having it for 14 months), £12m for 30 permanent beds really isn’t that much, but they’re still unsure about who’s running the business case – and this is what I need to be able to further detail budgets and importantly, release funds. Getting there though.
Magnus TAR Projects. My two originals are going well (must be my drive!) and the three I’ve taken on are moving OK and I’m getting to grips with them. As ever, WG PSN have had more management change, but I’ve been quick to get everyone together and inject some life; clearly it’s working! Flying down to Runcorn every week or two is killing the planet but makes communication and mutual respect infinitely better. I’m out to Magnus to survey them all on Monday with one of the TAR leadership team, my lead piping engineer and some guys from Spatial Solutions who do the 3D scans.
Mungo W160 Gas lift mods. Abbas, the petroleum engineer, was a bit taken aback when I quoted £1.48m (Capex) for the modification (essentially, the installation of a new pipe 2 foot higher up than the old one), although to be fair it’s only a third that cost in terms of Opex. Still, he’s not agreed to fund it yet so no movement. It’ll be a nice easy job if I do get it though!
Magnus Bunkering Lines. I’ll include these in my survey this week, and plan to get out to Poland and Norway to see the flotels before Christmas. Not been to either country before and the Renewals team are good guys, so I’m looking forward to it!
Magnus B Crane changeover and boom rest. This was one of Ish’s big ones, but in fairness it’s just another on my list! The boom rests are simply a structural job so happy there, and he’s doing a weighted analysis of the crane changeout methodology next week, so although I’ll miss it, I’m hoping there will be a good DSP and stakeholder agreement about which method to use. Regardless, it’s nothing I’m sweating over. Interestingly, Ish has been getting out to Holland every two months to check that Kenz are maintaining the already-built B Crane, so I’ll try and fit that in too. I’m sure I can make a good night out of Amsterdam somehow…
In other news:
- We’re collecting Dougal the German Wirehaired Pointer in a few weeks, after:
- Running the Skye Cullin Ridge this weekend
- Running the London to Brighton ultramarathon next weekend (www.justgiving.com/double1)
- And Liz and I run the Glencoe Mountain Marathon the weekend after that (www.justgiving.com/double2)
- Borneo was good and Pangkor Laut was unbelievable – pure paradise, and probably not too far from Perth if you hoods down-under fancy it?
- Amassing 20 people for “Beighton’s Barmy Bin Bag Army” at the Paralympics went brilliantly, and Nick made the Finals, and finished in 4th, just 0.2 secs behind the Bronze medal winner. Him and Sam beat the Aussies though!
- 39 Engr Regt has gained another Squadron, filling Liz with pure delight as it passes the 1,000 people mark.
Security is now a dirty word…
C4ISR (Request for Equitable Adjustment)
Initially I was supremely impressed with the contractor when he said he would meet the 4 week deadline we set him to respond to the initial response to his claim (currently stacked at $1.5M and estimated to hit at least $2.5M when he finally figures out what his sub contractors are doing.) The amount of detail we requested and the format required was huge. The Government requires all of his claims to be laid out in a Fragmented Network (FragNet) which is basically a Gantt chart showing all influencing factors behind a change. The contractor has now requested a 2 week extension now that he’s realised exactly what this means in relation to his claim. It’s actually a good job because our schedule specialist who is conducting a similar exercise from the Government’s perspective has let us down on his product, stating ‘technical’ issues. Once we get all our ducks in a row I am proposing that we run through a logic exercise to set parameters on the forthcoming negotiations.
SolarWall
I was annoyed with the contractor in the build up to the start of construction as he was unable to produce a number of documents that we had agreed were necessary before anything could begin. The work is taking place on a working building which processes all non-perishable logistical goods for the US military world-wide. If our contractor manages to get in their way he could affect the ‘mission’ which is running 24hrs a day 365 days a year. To this end I stipulated a 2 week look-ahead with a de-confliction plan and drawings of how he will isolate his crew from the mission. This was to be used to brief the building manager to de-conflict our construction activities from the mission activities. When I would not allow construction to begin until he had furnished the Government with the aforementioned documents there was talk of ‘delays caused by the government’ which was quickly squashed. We’re now all on the same page and construction is underway. A large steel jigsaw puzzle is being slowly spread over the face of the building.
The biggest frustration of late was with the security on base who have now decided to try and enforce some policy (which nobody has heard of) that means our contractors can’t enter the building they are working on – and there was a strong chance that all work would come to a complete stop and at huge expense. After ranting for a good half hour in the office I then found out that the guy who’s causing the problems is married to the woman in the next cubicle to me…..at least what I really think has been communicated via the unofficial route. As a result of this I have ended up writing two suggested methods that security could use to be able to enforce their own policy without our contractors being exposed to unnecessary risk.
The whole issue of digital vs non-digital record keeping is almost resolved. I have been buried under huge piles of paperwork for the last week just to get there. I now need to write a mini-procedure for if/when we end up doing similar ‘joint’ USACE projects.
Bldg 760 / 732
No involvement of late – the project is in the process of being awarded at higher level. Design review complete.
Headquarters Project…
My optimism for imminent progress has been crushed. Security have decided to stick their oar in and mix things up a bit for us all. Denying us access to certain areas that are necessary for construction to take place. The recurring theme here is that the security guys are working to enforce their own agenda as opposed to supporting the facility and working with them facilitate the mission in a secure manner. Quote of the day was ‘If it’s difficult, it means we’re doing our job well.’ IDIOTS! The construction is probably going to get into full swing just as I’m about to switch to phase 3….typical.
Ashley Reservist Center – (Still) Playing Sherlock Holmes
Still awaiting results from petrographic testing on concrete samples before deciding how to tackle the contractor. The issue of concrete quality has gone to a new level. Independent strength testing undertaken by the Corps lab has shown huge discrepancies between the independent lab and the specification requirements. The actual concrete provider is now under the microscope as we try to get to the bottom of what’s going on. Falsification of delivery tickets is also suspected.
Other news:
Boys returned safely to school. Naked house rules are in force.
Still haven’t won the lottery.
Country song updates [warning – don’t get drunk and sing these songs to your wife – then wonder why she’s pissed off with you (Roy)]:
I Don’t Know Whether To Kill Myself Or Go Bowling
I Wouldn't Take Her To A Dog Fight, Cause I'm Afraid She'd Win
My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend And I Sure Do Miss Him
She Got The Ring And I Got The Finger
You're the Reason Our Kids Are So Ugly
Have finally found some country music I can tolerate…..perhaps I’m starting to turn native? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRWMwpPlm28&feature=BFa&list=AL94UKMTqg-9CnpThBkCJ5dqZW-bExOM6B
Mineral Insulated Metal Clad Cable Blow Out – Calling All Cars
Last night (5pm) we had an electrical fault, which knocked out all mechanical services to just under half of the hospital. I’ve just ( 2pm) got the power back on, and am going for a beer with the boys (this is Australia after all), and then home. The work required a bit of on the hoof engineering but went well, but the cause of the fault, and so who pays, is contested. So I thought I’d ask you lot what you think; here goes.
At about 5pm, I was doing end of day checks after we’d been doing some work on the mechanical chilled water system. When I went into the plant room above the older section of the Hospital, I discovered that power had been lost and the air handling units were off. It turned out that the HVAC system to two blocks of the hospital was inoperable. I sent electricians to the Mechanical Services Switch Board in the Plant room, and to the Main Switch Board, from which it’s supplied to see if a breaker (fuse – these are old and crappy boards) had gone. A fuse on one phase of the sub main from the Main Switch Board to the Mechanical Services Switch Board had blown. As nothing appeared to have operated in the mechanical board, I sent a team to trace the sub-main between the boards to find the fault. It was pretty quickly obvious that one phase of the sub-main, an old (~35years) Pyro (Mineral Insulated Metal Clad – MICC) Cable had blown – picture below.
One phase of a MIMS cable sub-main had blow out, partially cutting another phase
MIMS cables are formed of one or more copper cores, surrounded by mineral powder (often aluminium oxide) encased in a copper sheath and possibly a PVC outer cover.
The pyros had been fixed to a cable tray using steel bands –apparently this is how it used to be done in Australia – instead of the copper straps recommended by the manufacturer of the cable. This is a picture of the type of gear they used.
On the tray, some demolished cables, had clearly once been fixed with the approved bands.
On inspection it seems that many of the steel bands had broken, and that the copper cable underneath was scored.
To me this suggests that over tightening of the straps has occurred, and, because the steel is harder than the copper cladding of the cable, the cables have been damaged. I suspect that a small penetration of the cladding may have occurred on installation, or as a result of vibration worsening damage caused by an over tightened steel band. Over time, moisture may have infiltrated the mineral insulation, breaking it down, until the a short occurred between the conductor and the sheath. My point is that this, in my opinion, constitutes a latent defect that would have eventually led to a fault, and that the client should seriously consider replacing the others cables that are in a similar condition.
The client’s representative, normally a mild managed man who just wants to be left alone, see things differently, however. He contends that either, the cable has been hit, or that excessive vibration has caused the cable, which he insists was not damaged during the original installation, to be cut by the steel strap. In either even, he insists, the fault, and so the cost, lies with us, the builder, and so he does not want to pay us for the repair work (~Aus$15,000).
I’m going to prepare a technical report form my PM about what the possible causes of the failure are, and what was most likely, and what the risk is of this happening to one of the others.
So there it is. What do you guys think? In particular, I’d be interested to hear if John has seen this before.
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