Cheshire Community House In Need of New Heating System
CHESHIRE, Mass. — Department of Public Works Director Corey McGrath told the Select Board the community house's boiler is in dire condition.
"It's on borrowed time," he said to the board during Tuesday's meeting.
The 28 Smith Cast Iron High Efficiency boilers were installed in 2005. Only one of the two boilers is working and the functional one is failing. It was explained that the furnaces were supplementing each other.
Blockage of mineral deposits and calcium buildup in the broken furnace
"It's like cement. So, what happens is, when water doesn't flow through it, it doesn't cool the boiler at the same time, and pressure builds, and that's where the seals blow out or cracks it," McGrath said.
The town decided to have one of the boilers regasketed but upon further evaluation, it was discovered the condition of the boilers are worse than originally anticipated, he said.
The center of the broken boiler has failed along with the nine sections that feed all the heaters.
Past maintenance records are limited so whether the furnaces have been fully flushed they way they should have been is unknown, McGrath said. The Community House was previously Cheshire School until 2017.
At this point, any repair measures are temporary fixes and continued repairs are becoming more costly than it is worth, he said.
McGrath presented to the board a mechanical, electrical, and plumbing engineering and design services proposal from Tighe & Bond Designer Services.
The scope of services included the design of a dedicated Packaged Roof Top Unit serving the town offices and common areas, as well as a dedicated packaged Remote Terminal Unit system to serve Youth Center Inc., which leases part of the building. The systems would be on new concrete support pads at the rear of the building.
During a site visit on April 9, Tighe & Bond determined that the existing electrical service lacks the capacity to accommodate the proposed new HVAC equipment.
Additionally, Tighe & Bond identified several non-conforming code issues present within the existing electrical service room, the proposal said.
Based on these observations, the proposed scope of work includes the design of a new
pad-mounted transformer located at grade, outside of the building.
"The new pad-mounted transformer will be dedicated to the 1959 section of the building, the proposal reads. "The existing service that serves the 1920 section of the building will be retained to serve the 1920 building."
McGrath is in the process of getting quotes to repair the nine sections to restore function until a redesign of the system can be completed, this is estimated to take about a year. An initial estimate was $47,000.
Board members asked if Tighe & Bond can potentially fast-track the project because of the urgency.
The hope is to move forward with the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing engineering and design to become shovel ready; then go to the town requesting funds to update the failing system, he said.
Tighe & Bond's proposed fee for its basic scope of services is $73,500.00. The proposal highlights in detail the scope of services and phases of the project:
- A schematic design that will include drawings indicating the locations of significant mechanical, electrical, and plumbing equipment, main piping or duct runs, and single line riser diagrams to illustrate the intent of the design.
- Construction document phases, which are broken in two parts, the 50 percent phase and 100 percent phase. During the 100 percent, Tighe & Bond will prepare permit-level design drawings and specifications for the proposed systems.
- A bid and permitting phase, which will commence upon the completion of the final bid documents. The town will be responsible for managing the bidding process. However, Tighe & Bond will provide bidding documents, attend one site walk through with bidding contractors, as well as prepare responses to requests for information, review bids for conformance and prepare bid tabulation, conduct reference check for the apparent low bid for each sub-bid category and for the general contractor and prepare a written recommendation of award to the town.
- A construction phase, which will begin once a construction contract has been awarded. During this process, Tighe & Bond will provide clarifications and interpretations of the drawings and specifications required during construction, review and approve, or take other appropriate action, regarding shop drawings and samples, make periodic visits to the site at intervals appropriate to the various stages of construction, review as-built drawings and operations and maintenance manuals, and reviews proposed change orders issued by the contractor.
Tags: HVAC,
