School jobs keep Haberberger hopping

July 1, 2005
ST. LOUIS No more pencils, no more books means Haberberger Mechanical here starts working on high school retrofit projects that can take advantage of the summer vacation period. Haberberger is continuing work this summer on a boiler and pump retrofit that began in March at McCluer High School. In June, Haberberger began two more projects at Parkway Central High School and the University of Missouri-St.

ST. LOUIS — No more pencils, no more books means Haberberger Mechanical here starts working on high school retrofit projects that can take advantage of the summer vacation period.

Haberberger is continuing work this summer on a boiler and pump retrofit that began in March at McCluer High School. In June, Haberberger began two more projects at Parkway Central High School and the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Each year the seasonal recess provides an opportune time for Haberberger to install or replace HVAC units in schools so classes aren't interrupted by the construction. The challenge of these projects is a strict eight-week timeframe that has to be met prior to the start of the new school year. To ensure this happens, a company spokesman said, Haberberger does extensive preplanning and early detection of any potential problems to help alleviate downtime during construction. In a $6.4 million project at McCluer High School, the contractor is retrofitting the building's boilers and chilled/hot water pumps, project superintendent Clay Buxton said. Haberberger has done work for the high school district before, but the job was awarded on a public bid.

The customer's preference for equipment is McQuay, Buxton said, because McQuay manufactures so many of the fan coil units and unit ventilators used in schools all over the country. Mc-Cluer has 275 unit ventilators.

McQuay fabricated a package for the project that sits outdoors with the boiler on the bottom of the 60,000-lb. enclosure, and the two 100-hp Bell & Gossett hot/chilled water pumps are mounted on a second level above the boiler. The system is two-pipe and the McQuay package includes a two-way valve to change over from heating to cooling. Two existing 375-ton McQuay chillers provide cooling. Buxton noted that chilled water pumps never served the part of the building where Haberberger is working now.

Buxton described the high school as huge with about 2,000 students, and it's actually composed of five buildings. Haberberger is working on buildings M3 and M5 for this phase of the project. The contractor will tackle buildings 1, 2 and 4 next summer. The project is scheduled for 18 months.

Haberberger is acting as the general contractor and Buxton is supervising 18 pipefitters, 25 electricians, six bricklayers, two laborers and three insulators.

"It went rather smoothly," Buxton said. "This is the fourth school that I've done and you learn a lot after doing a couple others. There haven't been any problems. Everybody got along."

Working with Johnson Controls as the Parkway School District performance contractor, Haberberger will provide new HVAC systems and replace existing systems during a twophase, $850,000 project at Parkway Central High School. Phase one will include the bulk of the work throughout the main building and will be completed before the start of school in mid-August.

Phase two includes natatorium work and is scheduled for summer 2006.

Haberberger will be working with general contractor Kozeny Wagner on a $ 1.9 million project for a new 120-unit student housing building at UMSL. Haberberger will install nearly 4,000 ft. of HVAC piping and controls within the six story, 130,000-sq.-ft. building. The project was scheduled to start in June and finish in summer 2006.

Haberberger Inc. is a 52-year-old, contracting company offering HVAC installation, customized maintenance programs, process piping and piping fabrication, and refrigeration and energy management services to a variety of industrial and commercial customers.

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