U.S. Navy Piers 2 & 21
Job Facts
Start dates: Pier 2 — July 1999
Pier 21 — March 2000
Completion date: September 2001
Architect: LANTDIV (Naval Facilities Engineer Command)
Howard Kelly, Designer
Construction Co: Tidewater Skanska
Jim Brookshire, Project Manager
Bill Eskins Jr., Lead Superintendent
Mike Boron, Project Engineer
Martha Gross, Engineering
Referral: Ace Marine Rigging & Supply
Morehead City, North Carolina
Tonnage: 500 tons of steel per pier.
Steel Supplier: Bulk of Material — Chapparal Steel, Texas
Steel delivered via railcar to B&B Welding.
Shipment: Shipped by flatbed truck using various trucking companies.
Machinery used: Peddinghaus beam punch line, Peddinghaus FPB 1800 plasma punch, Peddinghaus AFPS623 Anglemaster, submerged Arc Welder.
B&B Workers: All B&B Welding Company, Inc., employees had a hand in making this a success.
When the U.S. Navy decided to rebuild two state-of-the-art piers at the Norfolk Naval Base, B&B Welding was ready to jump aboard. Our mission: to protect the US battleships from crashing into the new concrete Piers 2 & 21. Our job: to create 316 steel fender assemblies and 8 corner bolster fender assemblies that attach to the new double decker piers along with various other smaller fabrications including frame and pipe hangers, guard rails, access ladders, vehicle ramp gates, etc.
Tidewater Skanska approached B&B Welding in July of 1999 to fabricate the fender assemblies for Pier 2. The job required full penetration welding, large-scale cutting and the use of B&B’s sophisticated CNC equipment. Most important, the job required that all 316 fender mounts and 8 corner mounts maintained dimensional tolerances. In other words, at the end of the day, B&B’s parts had to fit precisely the pre-cast concrete fittings on the piers’ bottom and the cast-in-place concrete at the piers’ top. That was the greatest challenge: “Everything had to bolt up, “says Dennis McCartney. “With all the welding and movement of the steel, we had to take extreme vigilance to interface the dimensions with the pre-cast concrete fittings.”
Vincent Lucas, Joseph Pallikal, and John Tanner spearheaded the project. These guys live by a B&B mantra: always work smarter. That means brainstorming ways to save time and cut costs. For starters, they built fixtures that enabled the guys to weld the round corner fenders in a flat position. Second, they invested in a submerged arc welding machine to make ¾-inch thick full penetration welds. Third, they coordinated with the galvanizer, Galvan Industries, to cut time and transport costs by sending Galvan the fender and corner bolster assemblies. Galvan bolted the UHMW bumpers and shipped then directly to Norfolk.
The results: two piers, and no complaints. All 316 straight fender assemblies and 8 corner assemblies matched to specification with no rejects and or back charges. Both piers were completed on time. And U.S. Navy battleships can now dock safely in Norfolk. It’s another job done smarter. By doing our job right, we reduce your risks.
That’s just the B&B Welding way of doing business.
