Week 25, Part 2- Mechanical and Operations progress

Both the Mechanical and Operations buildings are top priority at this stage for CNI. After building the largest two structures in the summer- Treatment and Phosphorous Removal- the Mechanical and Operations are smaller but contain critical equipment and controls to run the plant.

Last week the foundation grade was established and base rock installed. Here are some pictures from layout to rebar-







The middle section of the building- UV disinfection- has a lower floor. The next two pictures are just west of the UV room where the floor steps up to the Sludge Processing room, before and after the concrete pour-





Meanwhile, at the Operations building (just north of the Treatment building) the electricians are installing conduit....lots of conduit!





After the conduit install Owens placed fine gravel as a slab grade. The concrete floor is being poured over gravel on top of the conduit. The following two pictures show roughly the same spot before and after gravel is placed over the conduit (the Treatment building is in the background)-





Here is a lengthwise view of the Operations building after the fine gravel is in place before the concrete pour-

Week 25, Part 1- Railroad Crossing and Lift Stations

This week a major effort was finally begun- boring under a railroad track! This is the final stage in bringing the Effluent Force Main into the Wetland Discharge area. Going in the big unknown was whether a hard version of basalt would be encountered and take several days to drill through. Luckily, that was not the case. We did hit some rock but it did not create unusual problems.

Here is a good look at the boring equipment sitting down in a hole by the tracks-





While the drill bit was going under the tracks Thorco Construction monitored the location with a detector-



After boring the initial hole, they attached a "back-reamer" and pulled it through from the other side. This back-reamer is a medieval-looking piece of metal!-





During the back-ream operation a shaft broke and had to be welded back together. Here's an interesting shot of that repair-



While the railroad track under-boring occurred off the main site, Owens Construction was backfilling Lift Station 1. This pump station sits about 450 feet southeast of the Treatment building on the main site, for point of reference-





On the main site CNI (Contractors Northwest Inc.) built walls for the final lid on Lift Station 2. This is the pump station that sends treated water down south to the Wetland Discharge area-



Also on the main site, CNI started building forms for footings in the Mechanical building. This picture shows the middle of the Mechanical building- the UV room. More pictures of progress in the Mechanical and Operations buildings are in the next update!

Week 24, Part 1 Aero Mod system & Waterline connection

This week we finished the catwalk & handrail installation in the Treatment building-





And began installation the Aero Mod system in earnest. First order of business was a series of vertical piping in the aeration basins-







The suction hoods are staged on the concrete slopes. Some details were taken care of before installation-



Backfill continued around Lift Station 2-



And the main connection to bring water from the existing City of Plummer system down to the WWTP site was put in place-





Even away from the main site we still have to deal with groundwater!

Week 23, Part 2- Tank-1 and Treatment Building misc.

Near Lift Station-2- the point from which we pump the treated water off site- there are two other structures- Tank 1 and Vault 4. It turns out that Tank 1 sits so low that we needed to hammer out some more rock. Poor KC sat on the hammer for 2-3 days getting it down to grade!





Once the hole was low enough, Owens Construction was able to install the manhole for Tank-1 -







Over at the Treatment building a couple details were taking shape. The catwalk and handrail system was worked on-





Also the support wall for stairs on the north side was formed up-





Hmm, it's only foggy most mornings- here's the same shot 5 hours later!

Week 23, Part 1- Operations Building & Clarifier details

The Operations building progressed with a stem wall pour. This is on top of the footing we poured last week. On top of this stem wall we will have a CMU wall installed by a masonry subcontractor. "CMU" stands for "concrete masonry units" or cinder blocks, as some people might call them. The rebar dowels you see in the 2nd picture are threaded up through the blocks-







Once the stem walls were stripped of forms and cured the interior space was backfilled. The next phase will be electrical & plumbing installation-





While waiting for the electrical and plumbing subcontractors the walls and backfill are kept covered by concrete blankets-



During this time the forms for stair support walls on the PREM were built and covered also-





And finally some fun with photography-

In the Treatment building the Clarifier tanks had concrete slopes built on the floors. To smooth-finish these slopes, the rods which held the forms have to be burned back and the holes grouted over. The first picture here with the cutting torch was taken at 1/8th of a second, allowing the spark trails to be seen-



This next picture was taken at 1/1,000th of a second which freezes the individual spark-particles in the air, rather than showing the motion trail. The two pictures show the exact same activity, just at different speeds-