Good afternoon. Welcome to PCI's webinar series. Today's presentation is the art of thin brick precast facades. I'm Nicole Clow, Marketing Manager at PCI, and I'll be your moderator for this session. Before I turn the controls over to your presenters for today, I have a few introductory items to note. Earlier today, we sent a reminder email to all registered attendees. The email contained a webinar attendance sign-in sheet, a guide to downloading your Certificate of Continuing Education, and a PDF of today's presentation. The handouts are also available now and can be found in the handout section located near the bottom of your GoToWebinar toolbox. If there are multiple listeners at your location, please circulate the attendance sheet and send the completed sign-in sheet back to PCI per the instructions on the form. The attendance sheet is only for use at locations with multiple listeners on the line. If you are the only person at your location, there is no need to complete an attendance sheet, as we already have your information from registration. If you cannot download any of the handouts, please email PCI Marketing at marketing at pci.org as shown on your screen. Please note that all attendee lines are muted. The GoToWebinar toolbox has an area for you to raise your hand. If you raise your hand, you will receive a private chat message from me. If you have a question, please type it into the questions pane where I'll be keeping track of them to read to the presenters during the Q&A period. Also, a pop-up survey will appear after the webinar ends. Today's presentation will be recorded and uploaded to the PCI eLearning Center. PCI is a registered provider of AIA CES and has met the requirements of the AIA Continuing Education System and can offer 1.5 HSWLU for this presentation. Any questions about the content of this webinar should be directed to PCI. Credit earned on completion of this program will be reported to CES records for AIA members. Questions related to specific products or publications will be addressed at the end of the presentation. PCI has met the standards and requirements of the Registered Continuing Education Program, RCEP. We can offer 1.5 PDH for this presentation. Credit earned on completion of this program will be reported to RCEP.net. A Certificate of Completion will be issued to each participant. As such, it does not include content that may be deemed or construed to be an approval or endorsement by RCEP. With hundreds of attendees for our webinars, it is impractical to prepare individual certificates. As PCI has met the standards and requirements of the Registered Continuing Education Program, we will upload attendance data to www.rcep.net within 10 days and you can print your Certificates of Continuing Education. Your login name at www.rcep.net is your email address, so please do not leave that blank if you are completing the sign-in sheet. We need your email address to get you your certificate for this course. Our presenters for today are Randy Wilson, Director of Architectural Precast Systems at PCI. Joining Randy is Rob Esquizi, Vice President of Belden Tri-State. The next speaker is John Stafford, Architectural Representative for Endicott. Our final speaker is Marshall Walters, Owner and Founder of AP Formliners. Here is a high level of the program outline, which is broken down based on each presenter. At the end of the presentation, there will be a Q&A with the presenters. If you have any questions throughout the presentation, please submit your questions through the questions pane in your GoToWebinar Toolbox. Learning objectives for this webinar include describing methods to achieve color, form, and texture, reviewing embedded clay product resources, understanding insulated panel fabrication techniques, understanding R values and insulation types as it relates to building envelope performance, learning about precast concrete specifications, design resources, and the plant certification program, and explaining precast concrete applications using several studies. I will now turn the controls over to the PCI Architectural Director, Randy Wilson. Good afternoon, everybody. This is Randy Wilson. I am the Director of Architectural Services at PCI, and I appreciate everyone's attendance today for our presentation. Let's start my portion of the presentation. We'll start about by defining what is architectural precast concrete. Well, architectural precast concrete refers to any precast concrete component that through the application of shape, finish, color, or texture contributes to the architectural form and the finished effect of the structure. So, simply put, architectural precast is concrete components cast off-site in a controlled environment and shipped to the job site and erected on the building. So, we are, I would say, we are the preeminent and the first prefabricated component off-site construction, which saves a lot of cost, it can save a lot of time, and it can be considered a resilient product. So, precast components can be non-load-bearing cladding panels. They can be part of the structural building frame, or they could be the small decorative accents on a structural project, which could mean it could be coping and banding and trim inside a brick facade, or it could just be accent pieces between windows. The structural components can include exterior walls supporting the roof and the floors. They could be the stair and elevator shafts, or they could be a sheer wall. So, using precast panels as a structural component can save time, it can save money, and it compared to traditional cast-in-place or block elements. So, the different types of wall panels include a solid wall panel. A solid wall panel is simply what it states. It's just a solid concrete wall. It can be as thin as 5 inches thick, all the way up to 12 inches thick if it's going to be a load-bearing component. We can also provide insulated wall panels. Insulated wall panels can be non-load-bearing, or they can be load-bearing, and depending on the R value required, the wall panel can be anywhere as 8 inches thin up to 14 inches or more thick. Another type of wall panel is a thin-shell wall panel. Thin-shell is when you have a thinner section of concrete, and then those panels are actually attached to a steel frame inside the manufacturing facility. That can be done several different ways, but the advantage is there is you get a lighter weight system, but it still spans those column-to-columns and floor-to-floors that you typically can get with a solid or an insulated precast concrete panel. So, architectural precast is the main component to your exterior envelope system. It is attached directly to the building structure and is typically the first enclosure component installed. Therefore, it establishes the dimensions and tolerances for all of the materials. It can support the window systems, or in the case of a window wall scheme, the glazing can be installed in the precast plant. Once precast is installed and windows are in place, the only other step is to seal the joints. So, this becomes your complete enclosure system. It sets the tolerances for all other materials. Being the first material there, a lot of times it's scrutinized very quickly, but it also demonstrates to an owner or to the community that a new project is coming up and a new project is going to go up fast and it's going to be, and it gives it the first appearance of what the finished product is going to be. Architectural precast can also be part of a total precast concrete system. So, we like to say, give us a foundation and we'll build you a building. So, these panels can be designed as load-bearing, so they'd support the floor and roofs. They can also be designed as a sheer wall, interior or exterior, and can be fully insulated, as we stated before. There's a lot of options here, but this key takeaway is that precast is a strong, durable, flexible material. Architects and engineers should take full advantage of the product so they can save time and money and also reduce your risk by using a single source supplier. Structural precast panels can also support other structural components, like steel or block or other materials. So, the structural panels can be gray, they can be as-cast, they can be covered by the materials, or they can be produced with an architectural mix and finish to serve as the final building appearance, both interiorly and exteriorly. So, as stated before, the components can be solid or fully insulated, what we call edge-to-edge with no thermal breaks. And now you can reduce the amount of interior finish materials because the precast panels will serve as both the exterior and the interior finish surface. So, how do we make this product without any thermal breaks? Well, simple. It's a single width barrier wall. So, think of it that way. It's just a single width barrier wall. The outside of the precast panel is the outside of your structure. The inside part of the precast panel is the inside of your structure. So, what happens is, is that in between those two exterior and interior wise, we are able to insert edge-to-edge insulation. Therefore, your panel has no thermal breaks whatsoever. What holds the inside and outside of the panel together are what we call pins. There's different types of pins out there in the marketplace, and each producer uses something slightly different. But those pins hold the two wives of concrete together. So, what happens is, concrete can absorb and store a large quantity of heat and energy. And precast concrete's high thermal mass reacts very slowly to temperature changes. So, this characteristic reduces peak heating and cooling loads and thus reduces your HVAC unit sizes, reduces your energy consumption, and the result is you have more comfortable interior spaces using less energy to occupy and to maintain the building for the life span of the building. So, precast concrete in the form of an insulated wall panel is going to actually give you the opportunity to be more of a resilient structure. Because like I said, if you can reduce the amount of interior finishes because of the precast concrete being a single-wife material, the inside of that wall panel can actually be finished to look like drywall, or you can look like any other material. So, now that we've kind of defined what architectural precast concrete is and how to utilize one of these key benefits, let's define who is PCI and answer the age-old question, what can PCI do for me? Well, PCI was formed in 1954 as the Precast Pre-Stressed Concrete Institute. We are the technical institute for the precast concrete structures industry. PCI has had the distinct honor of establishing, developing, and maintaining the body of knowledge for precast concrete and is recognized as one of the top technical institutes and trade associations in the United States. But in simple terms, we are the organization to turn to when you have a question about precast concrete. Our purpose is to advance the use of high-quality precast concrete and structures. We do that through a collaboration of over 250 precast plants across North America who volunteer tens of thousands of hours each year to update our technical manuals and share best practices. And we also respond to market demands like sustainability and resiliency. And PCI certification is recognized as a leading and one of the most widely specified quality assurance programs in the construction industry. It is specified and are accepted by all major specification entities and government bodies in the U.S. and Canada. The reason these entities rely on PCI is because our comprehensive certification program includes in-plant production and in-the-field installation auditing to assure that all products are manufactured and installed to the stringent industry standards. These audits, these in-person audits in the plant and in the field are performed by a third-party engineering firm specialized in precast concrete. They've been doing it for decades. They know exactly what they're looking for and they're able to provide input to the individual plants on what, how they are applying our quality control manuals to their production department every single day. And what are those quality control manuals? Well, this is the technical data behind all the precast concrete certification categories. The PCI M&O 116 is our quality control manual for structural precast concrete products. The PCI M&O 117 is a manual for architectural precast concrete products. And PCI M&O 135 are manual intolerances for precast and prestressed concrete construction. So all of our plants are audited to these documents. And so if you as a customer of precast, you've specified precast, you're using precast, these manuals are available to you so you can hold the precast producer accountable for meeting your stringent specifications. So since we are talking about architectural precast today, I wanted to go ahead and talk a little bit about our architectural precast certification categories. So up until 2021, there was only one architectural precast concrete certification category. That category was called A1. In response to market demands, PCI members created five new architectural precast concrete categories that helps define a precast producer's capability and the markets that they serve. Once implemented, the precast producers selected the category that best represents their capabilities. These categories are not good, better, best. They don't reflect a quality score or an audit score. All producers in all categories must pass our stringent third-party auditing requirements. That's a given. They all have to meet those those technical manual requirements. So what's the difference in these categories? Well, the categories are that the producers are being audited to ensure their compliance with the complexity capabilities as outlined in each one of these categories. You know, due to time constraints today, I'm not going to be able to go through each one of these categories. But what I wanted to do is just kind of give you an idea what when we say complexity, what does complexity mean? So an AD category is more of a vertical warehouse type structural type panel with very little three-dimensional facade details, where if you go to the far right, which is the AA category, you can start to see gradually increasing in the amount of three-dimensional along with complexity shapes that a precast concrete producer can produce. To learn all about the new architectural certification program, you can go to our architectural certification supplemental requirements. This is on our website at pci.org slash arc search. This is available for anyone to see. Anyone can get it. It's free. It's just a matter of being able to look at that document and then fully understand each one of the categories as that category applies to your specific project. Another good resource for you as an architect or construction manager or an owner is going to our website and we have our guide specifications. Our guide specifications are broken down by each category, AA, AB, AC, and AD. So those are available for you. So if you want to use one of our guide specs, by all means, this is where to go. If you want to incorporate the new category or the specific category for your project into your master spec, just remember the original category A1 for architectural precast is not valid and it needs to be replaced with one of the new categories. So number one takeaway here today, well, you all have an action item and that is to go to your master specs, your guide specs in your firms, and make sure that that A1 certification category is removed and one of the new categories or the four choices are added back into that for your individual architects to revise on a project-specific basis. So one of the things in our specifications that I really want to talk about, kind of finish my section of this presentation, is sample. So our specifications along with our manuals outline the proper process best practices to manufacture high quality architectural precast concrete products. One of those areas that I, the question I get a lot, it can be all, a lot of questions I get about color, form, and texture can all be resolved with a sample selection process that's outlined in our manuals. So all of our precast concrete producers are happy to provide you with 12 by 12 custom samples for your individual projects. So how does that start and how do we get to the finish line? First, we start with 12 inch by 12 inch samples. Those samples are typically manufactured in a quality control department for an individual precast concrete plant, usually made in a small mixer or by hand. Those samples, just like every other precast concrete component, is made up of cement, fine aggregates, which are sand, a coarse aggregate, some sort of stone, and then pigments. And then in some cases you can add a coating after casting. But these, each one of these ingredients are needed to make precast, obviously, but they're also affects the color and the texture for your project. Any color can be made out of precast concrete and then what happens is we have an opportunity to finish the product four different ways. One's a sandblast, one's a retardant or exposed ag, one's an acid etch, and the other's polished. Each one of those have a little bit different depth, so there's different depth levels in each one of those also. So based on what you want your product to look like, we start with those 12 by 12 samples and then we apply one of these finishes to those samples and that's the sample that we provide. Now we're going to talk today about thin break and a little bit about terracotta, so those products can be added to those samples also. And you would follow the same sampling process for either one of those finishes. Once a 12 by 12 is selected, and you've all agreed that's the 12 by 12, that's the color we want, that's only to be approved to make a 4 by 4 sample. Don't ever just use a 12 by 12 because 12 by 12s were not typically made in the actual mixer that manufactures the precast concrete panels. So what you want to do is you want to now make a 4 by 4 sample, and once that 4 by 4 sample is approved, then the precast concrete producer will make a series of range samples. Those range samples will be slightly modified to give it the standard range of color that you can expect on your finished job. So if you've got a facade that has 30 panels on the job, each one of those panels are produced on a different day with different water in the air. It's got a different, even though we control every aspect of the pouring process, you still have some variables that are uncontrollable. So when the panels get installed, you're going to see a slight variation within a panel and from panel to panel. That's what these range samples are established to to help you realize what that acceptable range is. You can clearly communicate that back to the precast concrete producer. Once the range samples are approved, then if you're, if you so choose, you can have the precast concrete manufacturer make you a mock-up, a job site mock-up. So that's the process. 12 by 12s, 4 by 4s, range samples, and then a large scale mock-up or a full-size panel for approval. So if you follow that process, majority of the time you're going to be able to set, establish realistic expectations between the precaster and the architect and also between the precast architect, the construction manager, and the owner. Everybody's on the same page of what to expect when those finished products come to the job site. And finally, we also have a PCI certification program for our rectors. You can manufacture all the great products that you want. You can specify them all you want. You can make sure that the color is consistency within that range, but we also want to make certain that it's installed safely and it's installed to your expectations. And that happens because our rectors are also have to follow an auditing process. So when you specify a PCI producer in the AC, AB, or AA category, you're also specifying a certified erector. So again, we've got a lot of resources at PCI. I like to start with the educational resources. The education resource page has our e-learning center, which is a bunch of recorded webinars on just about every topic there is about precast concrete. And we also have an online academy, which is a little bit more deeper dive into specific subjects for precast concrete. And for the true just architectural resources, you can go to our design tab and you can go to architectural precast. And inside that, you'll see all the resources we have available to you so that you can learn a little bit more about how to design with architectural precast concrete. A lot of times whenever somebody starts this journey for architectural precast or structural precast concrete, they really just don't know what questions to ask. So using those resources kind of gives you the basis of trying to figure out exactly who to call, what to ask for, and what you can expect as far as design assists from precast concrete manufacturers. So don't be afraid to reach out to PCI or your regional director or to a local producer, because our local producers will be happy to provide you a basic feasibility study. We'll look at your project and say yep that's a great opportunity to use precast concrete or they'll be the first ones to say maybe this isn't a great precast application. But once they do realize this is a good precast application for you then what they will do is they'll do panel layouts, they'll talk to you about where to put the panel joints, how to treat those joints, connection schemes, connection locations, how's the panels going to attach to your structure, how are they going to interface with other materials, and then they can start that whole color texture sample process. One of the things that we also find that it's very important to architects, construction managers, and owners is the logistics of how this building is going to go together along with the schedule. So by looking at a site plan they'll be able to the precasters be able to work with you to define you know what size of crane you need, where the crane needs to set, how it works walks itself around the building, where the trucks are going to come in, how are we going to get truck there, what are some of the limitations you have on your site, and then they'll be able to help adjust all these other things, panel joints, panel layout, connection schemes, etc. based on your total site logistics. So precast producers like to do all that work up front therefore whenever you go into bidding your work scope is defined and now you're able to bid the project properly and all the expectations are established and there's no surprises down the road. So that finishes up a little bit about architectural precast along with PCI and what your expectations can be by working with a PCI producer. So with that I will turn the presentation over to to Rob. Hello, thanks for joining us today. My name is Robert Escrizi, Vice President Belden Tri-State Building Materials, and today I want to take you through a background of ThinBrick and the manufacturing process. So what is ThinBrick? ThinBrick is the same clay fired in the same kilns as traditional face brick. It's just manufactured in a thinner dimension, typically half inch to one inch in thickness, produced through the process of extrusion. The brick is fired in the same manner and results in the same appearance as face brick. So today we want to kind of walk you through the manufacturing process, take you on a virtual brick tour here. This is the bubbles you could follow along as we move through the process, but this shows you the different steps as we as we move through the manufacturing process. Okay, so making brick starts with a raw material. Typically the brick manufacturers in this country are located near that raw material source where clay or shale can be easily mined to supply the materials needed to make the brick. That mined material is then pulverized to the consistency you see on the right here. It's a ground clay or shale in a fine pulverized material. That material is then mixed with water and turned into a green clay. That clay is pushed under a tremendous amount of pressure through that extrusion cap. On the right you can see that extruder that's pushing the clay, the column of clay that's coming out to the left, and that's forming the shape of the brick. On the left you can see a close-up of that die. That die is what dictates the size and shape of the brick and those core holes. The core holes in the brick are created by those what look like bolts there, but those are the plugs that create the backside surface texture on a thin brick. So this clay is wet. It's firm and stiff enough that you can push your thumb into it and make an imprint, but it's still firm that it holds its shape throughout the process. So when thin brick are extruded, they're typically made one of two ways. It could be extruded in a cluster, which you see on the right here. What this is is a brick that's extruded with a perforation in it so that it can be fired and then the internal webbing or that core space in the middle can be knocked away after firing to yield to thin brick, a front and a back. And on the left you see a die that that makes an extrusion of what's on the right. The other way thin brick are extruded is they're sometimes extruded as a traditional face brick with coring in the center that will prepare it to be sawn. It's another way of doing it. Some manufacturers don't extrude it with that perforation curve. Some of them extrude it like a traditional face brick and they'll saw the front face and back face away from the brick. With either process the brick need to be dried before they're fired. So here's some pictures of brick in a drying chamber. The brick are dried for several days and just about all that moisture has to be removed from the brick. You need to get about 97% of that moisture out of that brick. You can't put a brick with moisture in it into a kiln because that water, if there's water inside that unit, it'll start boiling and the clay unit will explode in the kiln. So it has to be just about all dry before it goes into the firing kiln. Here's some pictures of a tunnel kiln. So you can see on the right that glow of that brick being fired. These brick are going through this tunnel kiln. Temperatures around 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Another method of firing brick is beehive kilns. Here's an example of a beehive kiln. There's not many of these left in the United States but it's a process in which the brick are stacked inside the kiln and fire is added to the kiln. So with a tunnel kiln the brick are moving through the tunnel. With this the brick are remaining stationary and the heat is added to the brick. This is a longer process. This could take three to four weeks inside the kiln. Whereas a tunnel kiln, they're only in there for three to four days. Now why is this process different and special and more time-consuming? Well it yields a beautiful color range. So that's what kind of sets the processes apart. This this beehive kiln process can yield some really unique colors. Okay so once the brick are fired, if they're extruded in a way that they can be cut, they're moved on to a high-efficiency saw. That saw is gonna cut the face in the back, recycle the center, and yield two pieces of thin brick. On the right there you can see some L-shaped corner units that are also being sawn from the brick. For brick that are extruded in a cluster, you can see here brick being separated. Sometimes they're separated manually by hand, sometimes they're separated with machinery, but you could see the thin brick that are extruded in the cluster are now here being separated and graded to be packaged. After the brick have been, after the thin brick have been separated, they're graded for dimensional tolerances. Because the PCI standard requires tight dimensional tolerances, oftentimes you'll have a manufacturer go to grind the edges of the brick. And you what you can see on the picture in the right here is these brick have been ground to a precise size. This grinding process ensures a tight dimensional tolerance that will work well in a precast application. After the brick have been QC'd and ground, they apply a coating of wax to the brick. On the left here you see some wax being sprayed onto the face of that brick. What this wax does, and this is requested by most folks who are embedding thin brick in precast applications, is this wax inhibits any concrete from bonding to the face of that brick. So that way, after the the panel is cast and the liner is removed away, it makes for easy cleanup. You can see this picture on the right, the gentleman here using a high temperature power washer, removing the wax. So what happens is that wax, you raise the temperature of that water with a high temperature power washer and you can melt that wax away. So the wax gets melted away. They always say, you know, work smart not hard, right? So you want to always raise the temperature of the water, not the pressure. You don't want to damage the face of the brick, so it's important to use high temperature, melt the wax away, and it reveals a clean and beautiful finished wall. Okay, after the brick are waxed, they're packaged in trays or cartons and put on a pallet, and then they're off to the precaster shop. Here's a recently completed project in New Jersey, but you know, we included this here. You could see the, on the top left, you can see the brick, thin brick, face down in a liner. Below it is that same panel in the precasters shop out in Pennsylvania after it's been cleaned down and the wax has been removed. And then over there on the right, you can see that same panel again on the building in New Jersey. Here's another beautiful thin brick and precast application. This is in White Plains, New York. Thank you again, and at this time I will turn it over to John Stafford. All right, well thanks Rob. My name is John Stafford. I'm the Northeast Architectural Rep for Endicott Thin Brick, headquartered in the big city of Fairbury, Nebraska. It's about an hour south of Lincoln, so that's actually where we manufacture full bed depth brick. We also do thin brick and clay pavers. Today, however, I'm strictly talking on thin brick embedded in precast. So specifically, we're going to look at the standards, we're going to look at the PCI specification, then we're going to just look at some of the sizes and the different finishes of thin brick today. So to first understand the the PCI specification, first we kind of have to take a step back and look at the ASTM standard for thin brick. So thin brick has its own ASTM standard, C1088. Basically under the standard for thin brick, you can see different specifications. These are going to be more useful for what I would call like a field applied job. These specifications kind of call out things like if the thin brick is meant to be used on the inside or the outside. It also touches on some of the dimensional tolerances and the physical properties. Looking at these three types here real quick, TBA, TBS, and TBX, the dimensional tolerances here are really important. So the TBA actually has the loosest dimensional tolerances at none. There are no dimensional tolerances for TBA thin brick. So as you can imagine, that definitely brings up a new set of challenges if you're trying to embed something with no dimensional tolerances into a form liner and then into your precast panels. TBS is a little bit stricter, so that's kind of your standard. It is for the general use in masonry. We've got a chart here on the next slide, but the tolerances can range from plus or minus a quarter of an inch for your standard size modular brick. And then you work your way up, or in this list going down, to the TBX. So TBX is the strictest level of dimensional tolerances for ASTM. And yeah, you're right around plus or minus 5 32nds of an inch. So here's the chart I was referring to. This goes over some of the tolerances for shorter brick than your modular size, and then all the way up to brick up to 16 inches long. Again, so now that we've kind of dove into the ASTM standard a little bit, the PCI specification is extremely important, and that's kind of what we're here to talk about today. So basically PCI, with help from multiple manufacturers and multiple precasters, have written a specification specifically for thin brick embedded in precast. So this specification is going to be a lot more stringent than your typical ASTM 1088 standard for thin brick. And yeah, this is just a really important document. I encourage everybody to ask for a copy of this and use this in your specification. And so talking about the size tolerance in the PCI spec, the thickness is never going to be less than a half inch, and it's never going to be more than one inch. The face sizes, pretty much all the sizes you can get in full brick, you can pretty much get in thin brick. The size and the texture are always going to be specified per the architect. So that's if you're specifying a new texture color for a new building, or if you're specifying something to match an existing building. The back surface, this is incredibly important. Long story short, there's two ways to make thin brick. There is the saw cut method, where you fire a full-size four-inch deep brick and then cut the face off. And then you also have the extruded method. That's a lot more similar to clay tile. Adding a back surface can be done on both, but it's a lot more efficient with the extruded method. So that back surface is what's going to give you that bond to the concrete in the precast panels. So it's very important that you're not using just a flat back brick here. Dropping down here to the dimensional tolerances, again these are a lot stricter than your ASTM 1088. So for face size, for modular size brick, you're at plus zero minus a sixteenth of an inch. So again, that's an incredibly tight tolerance. However, this is really important, especially for the precaster, because when they are installing these brick into the form liners, they have to have that perfect fit. If the brick's too short, the concrete is going to bleed through, it's going to get all over the face of the brick, and yeah, it's going to make a mess basically. So thin brick basically has to be perfect when it's being placed in these form liners. The dimensional tolerances also address warpage and bowing. I'm going to show you guys how to measure that here in a second. Add a square, it's going to be plus or minus a sixteenth of an inch. And then for any corner pieces, plus or minus one degree from a specified angle. So this is kind of your standard way to measure your flat pieces. So this is just a standard caliper, assuming this is your modular seven and five-eighths brick, this piece would fit the PCI tolerance. This is kind of a good point to bring up or a good time to bring up the point that clay is a natural product. Every manufacturer definitely has their their own ways of ensuring that the brick is PCI compliant. However, I always encourage for the pre-caster to kind of do their due diligence and measure for size tolerances out of multiple boxes, multiple pallets, whatever the case may be. Basically as soon as the products received, so if there are any issues you can start addressing it as early as possible. So yeah, I mentioned we're going to look at how to measure size tolerance or warpage. Got some cool animation here, but the little metal piece that you're seeing here is actually what we call a PCI wedge. So a lot of our brick distributors, myself, we're handing these out to pre-casters as we're making our visits all over the country. So the right way to measure for the warpage here is laying the brick face down on a flat surface and sliding that wedge under basically every elevation of that thin brick. And for the PCI tolerance you have up to a sixteenth of an inch for warpage. Stacking them here on the left and looking for warpage that way, that can always be a little deceiving to the eye and it's not the proper way to measure. Measuring size tolerance for corners. So I mentioned this earlier, but it's plus or minus one degree from the specified angle. So assuming that this is a 90 degree corner here, this brick would meet the PCI tolerance. Shifting gears to the physical properties of the thin brick, these are equally if not more important than the dimensional tolerances. And we'll go over these kind of just starting from the top. So the modulus of rupture, formerly known as your braking strength, is no less than 250 psi. The cold water absorption is definitely an important one on here. You want a brick that has a low absorption rate. You don't want the brick to take on moisture and possibly be negatively affected by freestyle cycles. The pullout strength is going to be 150 psi minimum. You want the test to state that the brick will not effloresce. Chemical resistance is pretty standard. So basically you just you don't want the brick to be affected by certain chemicals. We're gonna look at some some test reports here in a minute that kind of go over this in a little bit more detail. We're also going to look at a letter of certification from the manufacturer. We're gonna look at an example of that letter. And then the back surface texture. So the back surface texture should be the same on all. It should be uniform throughout the whole project. So here's kind of your standard ASTM test report. So note this is not the PCI test report, this is your ASTM. You can see up at the top, so this is from Clemson University. Clemson is kind of the the designated university for all clay masonry testing. But starting up at the top you can see some some really low absorption rates here. You can see that the brick will not effloresce. Modulus of rupture, those are averaging almost 2,000 psi. Chemical resistance, again this is kind of going to let you know what chemicals could affect the appearance or the physical properties of the thin brick. And then freeze-thaw cycles, ASTM kind of briefly goes over and for their tests you have to pass 50 freeze-thaw cycles. And this brick did pass for this test. Now looking for a more specific, the PCI standard test, again from Clemson University here. So this is going to be your key back extruded thin brick. You can see here on the left, before the freeze-thaw the pull-out test must meet 150 psi. So you see that first row up at the top, the average came out to 209 psi. So this passed. And then after the 300 freeze-thaw cycles on the bottom here, let's see, the average was right at 186 psi. So this one passed also. These types of test reports I think are incredibly important. This is kind of what helps the owners, the architects, and even the brick manufacturers kind of sleep better at night. I really encourage architects, precasters, not to be afraid to ask the manufacturers for copies of these reports. So yeah, this was one of the certification letters we talked about from a liability standpoint. This is an incredibly important piece of information. Again, don't be afraid to ask for these. Basically just states that this brick will meet the PCI specification for this specific project. So lastly, to kind of conclude my portion of the presentation, we're just going to glance at some of the different sizes, shapes, and finishes of thin brick offered for precast applications. Again, I mentioned this earlier, but thin brick is pretty identical to full brick with sizes. However, unlike full traditional masonry projects, with the thin bricks, you have to use the corners and the edge caps. So up top is kind of just your standard size for your flats here, then you've got your standard corners on the bottom. Transitioning into edge caps, so edge caps are going to be for finishes around windows and doors, basically any opening in the wall. We've got some Rolox sills down in the bottom corner also, but these are kind of the chef's kiss per se, and this is what will help make your precast project look like a traditional full brick project. So sizes, textures, colors, basically all that's going to be up to the architect and the owner. You're not just limited to your smooth face, tile, lookalike, product, there's a ton of different options out there with face texture. Switching something basic, just switching kind of like this picture here, switching color and switching texture in the wall makes for a very budget-friendly, unique look. So here's kind of just your sleek, your smooth, black thin brick. The velour texture definitely adds a little bit of a roughened texture or roughened look to the wall. Your smooth and your velour are typically your two most common textures. Then you've got your matte texture, so this is definitely a little more aggressive than the velour, but I've seen a ton of projects where, again, they're combining textures and colors on the same job to pull off some really beautiful projects. This is the artisan texture, one of my personal favorites. It's incredibly popular in the design community right now, and it really brings a whole new perspective to brick. Then your vertical scores, this is going to be great for matching older existing jobs. So some banding, a great detailing brick. Got your heritage texture on the left that has that wormhole look to it. It definitely gives off some more rustic-type vibes, and then on the right, you have your traditional sand face texture. Glazed-in brick is definitely checking all the boxes, all the trendy boxes right now in the design community. Precasters are also enjoying the benefits of glazed-in brick in their plants, because it's a bit more forgiving to remove any concrete bleed off the face of the brick. So that's kind of all I got. Thank you guys a lot, and yeah, I'll pass this on to Marshall. Good afternoon. My name is Marshall Walters. I am the owner and CEO of Architectural Polymers. At Architectural Polymers, we manufacture form liner for precast concrete applications. In particular, one of the products that we make is a thin brick form liner for the precasting application of thin brick inlay. Welcome to the presentation. So this course description will include thin brick form liners, textured form liners, and custom form liners. So the thin brick form liner is the first one that we'll start with, but what's pictured on the picture to the right is a textured form liner, and we'll get into discussions on that as well. Now, there are a couple of different versions of thin brick form liners. There is a single-use plastic thin brick form liner and a multi-use urethane form liner for thin brick. With the single-use plastic thin brick form liner, there are some distinct advantages to it, not any better or any worse than the urethane form liner, but the differences might make a choice in the way that you are casting panels. One of those choices is cost and availability. Another choice reason might be it's great for a variety of different size panels that you have to manufacture. So in that particular case, if you have a lot of different size panels, you probably would not want to buy a multi-use form liner and be cutting it to do all the different size panels. You probably want to go with something that's a little bit less expensive, which the single-use plastic form liner is less expensive, and it's not as painful to the wallet when you're cutting it for the different size panels. Single-use plastic form liners require everyday form cycling, which, again, if you're doing different sizes of panels and you're varying that a lot, the everyday form cycling happens every day no matter what because of all the different sizes. So the plastic liner is suited for that. So that might be a reason for that. On the environmental side, thin brick plastic liners have recycled content. At least 50% of a thin brick plastic form liner is manufactured from recycled plastic. Thin brick plastic form liners are interesting because the way that they are manufactured, you can actually put the instructions right on the liner. So you can, say, put the red-colored brick in this pocket, put the black-colored brick in this pocket. And finally, they're best with PCI-compliant brick. In this slide, you can see to the right where a drawing was supplied to the customer. You have the instructions where it says the red brick is on the right-hand side. That's where the red brick goes, or excuse me, that's where the orange brick goes. That's actually an orange color. It looks red on my screen, but it is orange in color. And then the, what we call the beehives, those were the red-colored brick marked with the letter A. So you marked with the letter A and you put the red brick in all those spots and then everything else was orange. And you can see on the picture on the left, that's how you can actually put directions in the form liner in a single-use plastic liner. And you can create an interesting array of designs and patterns. In this next slide, which is a slightly pulled-back version, it's a different job, but you can see how the instructional form liner is working to bring out a particular X pattern on this job. In this slide, a plastic liner was developed for a special type of brick, which had a rolled tumbled edge. Plastic liner advancements are coming at a greater amount and they are now able to do a lot more architectural things for pre-casters than they were 10 years ago. The other type of thin brick form liner that we spoke about was the multi-use urethane thin brick form liner. It's made out of a very durable and stretchy rubber where the pockets on the edges actually have these little windshield wiper gaskets that grab the brick. And they perform the same function as a thin brick plastic form liner, but do it a little bit differently, which makes it more useful for certain types of projects. First element to consider with the multi-use liner is the cost. Actually the cost for a multi-use liner is less if you use it a certain amount of times. And it's not a reasonable amount of times, maybe 15 times, and you're kind of sitting at the same cost as using a thin brick form liner. Obviously you don't have to form cycle every day because the urethane liner goes down in the form and it's meant to stay in the form. So that really makes it optimal for repetitive panels. As you can see on the picture on the right, on those arches, they're all the same arch over and over and over and over again. And you can see there's a liner that was used to cast all of those pieces. So every time the cost of the liner, every time the liner is used, the cost of it halves itself to the point where if you use the liner 20 times, it's actually about $20 a square or $1 a square foot. So if you use it 40 times, it's 50 cents and so on and so forth. And that's kind of the advantage of a multi-use liner. Also the gasket in the pocket keeps the slurry of the concrete from moving around to the face of the brick, which makes it much easier to clean and really we use less labor to do it. And of course, time is money. Urethane multi-use liner is also best for ornate brick details and kind of custom brick jobs, special layouts, bump out, three-dimensional details. And it can also facilitate a larger tolerance brick, the TBX thin brick, and it can handle that as well as the PCI thin brick tolerance. So in this project, a very unique project, it was a urethane liner system because you can see all the panels had a bit of a curvature in them, but they were all basically the same height and the same length. So it made a lot of sense to use a multi-use form liner because all the panels had the same detail. Of course, it used a glaze brick with about four different colors that were blended together at the factory to create a particular type of style of detail with the coloring of those glaze brick. But the liner portion, the form liner that was used for it was a multi-use liner and it was used multiple times to create that facade. Urethane form liners are also good for terracotta as well as the plastic form liner. You can use that for thin terracotta cast into concrete panels, either or, for the same reasons. The urethane form liner is great for heavily textured brick because the soft nature of the rubber actually cushions the thin brick, which during installation, the manufacturer can actually step on the brick and because of all the texture on that brick, if you're using a plastic liner on a steel bed, you may actually break the brick by stepping on it because of all the different facial features of that brick. But with a urethane liner, it actually cushions that effect. You might choose a heavily textured brick and a urethane liner might be better for that. Here's where we're talking about a lot of different ornate pieces to really give a random effect. It would be really difficult to do with a plastic form liner with all the cutting and splicing and all the pieces that you need to make for it. It's very custom. This job really kind of screams rubber form liner, multi-use form liner is the term. You can see a close-up of that in this slide on the left and then the effect of that as you move back on the right. There were five different thin brick sizes that were incorporated into this custom pattern. Here's another detail, which is a multi-use form liner. This project is very interesting. It's really only one archway in the whole job that this was the only piece. But it was so difficult to step up and do that a urethane form liner was really the only option. In this particular project in Philadelphia, the effect was to have a half inch of random brick protruding out from the underlying brick face. To do that, it needed to use a urethane form liner that had differing pockets. It had a one pocket on a certain plane and it had another pocket that was on another plane. There were two thicknesses of brick that were used, a half inch thick brick and a one inch thin brick. Obviously, the one inch brick went in one pocket and the half inch brick went in the other pocket. It was made to give a random effect, which is what it has done in this slide. In this project, and you can see the multi-use liner in the lower left, this is the ultimate of multi-use liner because it really is very unique and there's a lot of depth of relief. You cannot do something like this with a thin plastic liner. What's really neat about it is it's also very repetitive. We did a good job with the repetitive nature of it. There's actually only two different types of form liner. There's a left facing form liner and a right facing form liner. In the photo to the lower left, it's the left facing form liner that creates the panel above it. As you can see, those panels are very repetitive from first story to third story to fifth story to seventh story, the same panel. Then on the even numbered stories, it's the opposite facing panel, which was made off of the second form liner. A great use of repetitive nature using a urethane form liner with a thin brick. Here's where we get into some really neat details with the urethane form liner. Keep in mind this can sometimes in a single planer, a way you can actually adapt a single use form liner to do it. In the pictures to the right and the lower right, you can see where there's a lot of detail. This is a tumble thin brick with some tolerance differences and changes because of the nature of the way it's made. However, the urethane liner can handle those tolerances and can make some pretty neat looking antique like panels. So we said we were going to talk about single and multi-use textured form liners that are often used on data centers, warehouses, schools, and gymnasiums, storefronts, parking garages, hospital stadiums, and whatever else you can find. Anything that is precast pretty much, I've even seen them on bridges. And really you can generally choose from a catalog of textures. Most manufacturers have probably upwards of a hundred patterns that you can choose from in different categories of wood, stone, fractured fan, ribbed, and sort of abstract as well. In this photo here is a combination of using a multi-use form liner because it's the same panel. This is sort of like a slightly ribbed wood pattern type of texture. And it's used over and over and over again with all the different panels that you see there going across the way. And below it was used a multi-use form liner for what we would call the artisan brick or a textured brick that the rubber liner actually cushioned and cast into the panel without breakage. This is another project that we're showing here, combinations, where you have a multi-use form liner that was used on what you see in the foreground, basically the big University of Scranton crest. And then to the right, you have a lot of panels here with thin brick, and this is a college dorm. It's a common theme here where you'll have a multi-use and a single use job. The multi-use liners were used on the bottom portion of this project, and they were just generally squares that were turned 90 degrees so that you could get a multitude of patterns and get multitudes of looks on those patterns. And those were multi-use liners that were used over and over to do the brick detail on the bottom of the building. However, you couldn't really do that on the top. There was a lot of chopping and cutting, and the best solution was to actually just cut single-use plastic textured form liners for the top portion of the building so that you had basically a completely random facade, and that was the goal of the architect. Here's an actual photo of that project when complete. Here's the ultimate. What we have here is a thin brick project along with a thin stone that was cast into the concrete panel and a form liner texture at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia on the crest on the top of the building. So you had three types of form liners being used on this project. And here's a very custom urethane textured form liner. You can see the close-up in the lower left-hand corner, and then it really is – it's basically like a pool house cover. There's a pool on top of the building. It's a residence in Washington, D.C., and they needed to put some kind of structure over top of the pool, and that's what they used. This is a custom urethane pattern. It was designed so that the pattern followed through and carried through all the panel joints. So you can see that on the left where those parts essentially come through the panel joints. At a certain angle, the panel joint completely goes away, and that's what the architect was looking for. This could not have been accomplished with a single-use form liner. The maximum size of textured single-use form liners are generally around 4 foot by 12 foot. So a much larger full-size liner was needed, and in this particular case, a custom urethane form liner that was designed specifically to have matching points at the panel joints. When we spoke about the thin-brick liner, the multi-use thin-brick liner, we talked about repetition. And for textured form liners, it's generally the same rule. If you're doing a lot of form change-outs, you're doing a lot of things, or the panels are different, or they're all different sizes, and you're able to work with the footprint of 4 foot by 12, a plastic liner system may do. But in this particular case, each section on each floor is a separate panel. So I'm counting 48, 50 different panels that are the same thing and on the right hand side you can actually see a close-up of it. This is a perfect example of where you would want to use a multi-use form liner because you're essentially casting the same thing day in day out. Very little forms change over and in this particular case it was a great idea where they actually made it so that there's a bit of a see-through element to it. It's more like a screen effect and you can actually see through the concrete panel. In this photograph we see a what we would call a photo-engraved form liner. It's a urethane form liner. It can only be urethane form liner and what it's done is it sort of put it took a photographic image and was manufactured to manipulate light and shadow from the sun on the concrete panel so that the photograph image actually came out. This is a great angle to view it at and you can see that you're looking at a forest where you have white birch trees. This is kind of the the ultimate for multi-use form liners because of the depth of relief and the nature of murals. There were 88 different panels on this project all one-time use even though one-time use would be really a great consideration for plastic form liners. These panels were much too big and the depth of relief was far greater than what you could use with a single-use liner. So the job was requiring multi-use form liner and again as we said 88 different panels created this entire mural. Obviously a lot of CAD and modeling had to be done because you do have some space in between each panel so it was important that the lines lined up correctly whether the panels were touching or at least set close to each other but whether they were spaced apart we needed to keep the image flowing throughout the curvatures and the wall sections of this project. Statue of Liberty and all the great things that the New York City area has to offer all in a parking garage for the Newark Airport. Thank you for this part of the presentation and I hope to take your questions. Thank you to our presenters for a great and informative presentation. We will now start to the Q&A portion of our presentation. The first question is how do you apply range samples to thin brick applications? I'll take that first question. Range samples are a very key component as was stated in the presentation to ensuring that you have you set as expectations of what the finished color is going to be on a project because naturally precast panels are poured you know two or three panels or more a day over a series of many days therefore you have an opportunity for panels to have slightly different color through the process. Well brick is the same way. Depends on what brick you choose whether it's a monochromatic type brick it's just all smooth red or if it's a blend of three or four different colors of brick. The range samples that are created using precast concrete should be utilizing brick from the brick manufacturer that represents the the actual run. So you would actually go ahead and make those same four or five range samples cast the brick into it or maybe even cast a band of exposed concrete to represent the the overall project design and then the precaster will cast those range samples and give it some sort of a slight different appearance to best replicate what the finished product is going to look like. And typically in a range sample you'll have the same sample one is light and sample five is dark. An architect would then pick a proper range that they feel like is it acceptable for their project. They would say between sample three and five is the acceptable range or between sample two and three is acceptable range. But you have that open dialogue with the brick distributor with the precast producer along with the architect and the owner all standing there at the precast plant so you all can set some realistic expectations. But that's the process so including that brick in that process is is how you would make the range samples for a brick face precast job. Perfect, thank you Randy. What is the brick selection process if we want to mix embedded thin brick, field apply to thin brick, and full brick on a project? Hi there. I can, if Rob is crazy I could take this one. So with the different applications of thin brick it's always recommended that a mock-up is built of each application. I would certainly recommend that these are viewed together on the job site. So if you have thin brick that are field applied, thin brick that are embedded in a precast, you would want to have your precaster make that 4x4 mock-up. The field installer make that 4x4 mock-up. And a full cavity wall 4x4 mock-up and reviewed for approval. Robin, if I could kind of piggyback on that. From the manufacturer's perspective I always encourage architects to to pick up the phone and call the brick distributors. A lot of these companies represent multiple manufacturers. Some manufacturers might only make one brick in full and not thin, but from the distributor level they can kind of help and guide you guys through the process. Yeah I'll also add to that too if I may that sometimes you may find that it's it's most advantageous for a project not to have all those different products to match. You might find a where you could you could run an accent color through the full brick that matches the thin brick or vice versa. So that way you may you may find that it's the most economical option and also the most compatible option, especially when you talk about thin brick compatible precast. It might be best just to kind of mingle two different manufacturers in the process. And that's where your brick distributor will be able to help you once you fully understands the project needs they can they can guide you in that direction. Perfect, thank you everyone. Our next question is how effective are the joints between the panels from an insulating standpoint? That's a very good question. Joint questions are always always fantastic. There's different ways to treat the joints. We recommend a two-stage joint for all precast to precast joints. What that looks like is that you would have a you know if you have an open joint you'd first from the outside of the precast panel you'd put back a rod and then a then a bead of caulk towards the back side of the of the precast joint and then you would put a finished caulk joint on the face of the precast panel. So that's the basic way to do it that creates an airspace and that also helps create some insulation value there. If you're doing a interior finish then there'll be insulation there and that'll also help that insulation between the joint or through the joint. If there is no interior finish then you can actually put insulation in the joint. Typical joints anywhere between a half inch and one inch once it actually gets installed. It's usually designed a three-quarter inch with a quarter inch tolerance. So you're able to actually put insulation in the joint whether it be a spray foam or if it's some sort of a material that's packed in the joint like a expandable joint filler or just simple insulation. Thank you. Our next question is how does a heavy texture thin brick meet the PCI specification? You want to take that one John? Yeah so the the texture again like when we were looking at the slide again the thin bricks never going to be under a half inch it's never going to be thicker than than one inch. So a lot of that heavy textured thin bricks coming in around 5 8ths of an inch and and that meets the specification. So that's a back surface texture and basically everything your your normal flat thin brick would have just slightly larger with some texture on it. Yeah the other feature for that is the the size of the brick. If it's a modular brick 7 5 8ths by 2 and a quarter a highly textured brick even if it has a kind of a rolled edge the actual out-to-out dimension of those those pieces are rectilinear. That's the part that actually fits into that form liner pocket. So the form liner pocket manufactured out of a plastic or elastomeric is got very very small millimeter tolerances. Whereas John explained a thin brick has a wider tolerance because it's a you know clay shell material baked in a kiln so it has a little bit larger tolerances. That's why a lot of thin brick manufacturers actually grind or trim the brick to the exact rectilinear size to fit into that into that pocket. If you did want a textured brick that's going to fit into that pocket these brick manufacturers have the capability of giving that the great texture on the outside but keep the size of that product rectilinear to fit into the liner. Another reason why calling your brick distributor and really explain to them we're considering precast concrete as a as the envelope but I want it more of a textured brick then the brick distributor will be able to help you find the right manufacturer for for that application. Perfect thank you John and Randy. The next question is how does the architect receive the individual brick testing reports? Is it as simple as asking the manufacturer and what if they are not willing to provide the reports? Yes I brought up the report so I can kind of start this but yeah most most manufacturers should. You can ask your brick distributor we're handing them out to precasters, again developers, owners and as far as to why not a manufacturer wouldn't want to give the report I can't really speak speak to that. Rob or Randy? The only thing I could add to that is you know again from the from the Precast Concrete Institute side of that is that we do have a specification and a best practices to where the again going into a project that eyes wide open a brick manufacturer should be able to inform the architect or the owner of their individual product testing what they've how they've tested the material if they've tested it through the freeze-thaw cycles through the assembly assembly freeze-thaw cycle test through Clemson University and the National Brick Research Center or some other third-party entity and then be able to clearly communicate to the precast or the form liner how their product will perform whether it be through the individual characteristic testing whether it's being their internal testing or a third-party testing. They should be able to provide that information to the to the architect or the owner if they don't provide that information then it really should be questioning the compatibility with material and the precast concrete system. Thank you. Our next question is how does the brick coursing work with precast panel sizing? That's a perfect one for Marshall I think. Yes, brick coursing is really taking up with the form liner. The form liner is manufactured as what I would call the modern-day mason where it'll actually set those pockets in those mower joints in a way that keeps up with traditional brick coursing and that would be the traditional brick sizes or really any brick size but most of the time US Modular, US Utility, US Norman, and closure size. Yeah I'll add to that from a from a precast panel perspective and again this is this is the hope hopefully of architect help architects and designers kind of define questions they would ask a precast producer. Taking a preliminary elevation to a precaster and saying you know this is what I want the building to look like here's what the brick size I want to use here's the coursing I'd like to use but how would I panelize the job? So a precaster may say let's run these panels column to column it's a 30-foot column to bay how does that equate to brick coursing with a 3 8th inch joint? And you may find it doesn't work out perfectly once you start to incorporate the 3 quarter inch precast joint in that overall facade layout. So what I always encourage architects to do is add some sort of detail within the precast panel to break up the brick field. That could be an exposed precast band vertically or horizontally kind of or a stone detail or some sort of a stone element. I know Marshall showed some really cool pictures about you know adding crests, adding lettering, adding some some sort of form liner that has some some texture onto it. Anything to break up that course that brick coursing just so the course now aligns perfectly with the precast nominal precast dimension. So a precast panel 30 foot it's not gonna be 30 foot it's going to be you know 29 and 11 and a quarter or something. So and then you have to adjust the brick coursing for that. What you want to avoid is is sliver bricks. You don't want to lay out a brick coursing starting at the the you know left-hand corner of your of your elevation and just run that coursing all the way to the right side of the elevation because when you start to get those panel joints the the brick coursing will start to accumulate to the point where you'll actually have a sliver brick. A sliver brick might be a little piece of brick that's you know two inches at the panel joint and then that's that's not going to look good nor it's going to be easy to to execute and it's also going to cause that repetitive brick coursing to come out of alignment. So it's very very much important that you set down with your precast producer look at that brick coursing layout and then define how you want to make those adjustments in your design. And I think most of our architects will find is they can add some some really cool architectural features for a very low or no cost whatsoever. Wonderful. Thank you Marshall and Randy. We have time for a couple more questions. So our next question is do you apply any kind of bond breaker between the form liner and the brick face? Yeah you would when you put a form liner down regardless the form liner type you would most precasters will put a release agent down on the form primarily because not necessarily for the brick itself because the brick typically has wax on it and it was explained in the presentation the wax is there just as superficial protection for the brick during the casting and cleaning process but you also want that form release agents for the for the precast joints and especially if you've got some exposed precast areas so you can picture a panel like it when Marshall showed one we had a brick band and then above the brick band you had a really cool form liner texture so you'd put a release agent for the entire piece including the brick area. Perfect thank you. Our next question is how do you handle site logistics transportation crane placement and installation? Great question that's a very large question that I would love to have a full presentation on. Typically what a precast producer will do early in the design process because there are limitations there could be limitations in production panel layout connections etc based on crane placement and size of panels so what what a typical precaster would do early in the design phase would say do you have a site plan where is the building going what are the site limitations I've worked on projects where you put in a building within 10 feet of a railroad active railroad which is not a good situation for a precast to be in but we worked we worked a solution because we were able to actually put the crane on the inside of the footprint and reach from the inside of the footprint to the panels without encroaching on the railroad so it really is specifically site specific and a precast producer there they look at that equal to all the other factors in a precast job so they'll look at a site they will look at the transportation route their bridges overpasses they'll look at the size of panels the amount of weight per each truck they will look at where do I put that we're gonna put the truck on the site how big of a crane do I need to for the largest precast piece and the longest reach and then they will give you a guidance on on how that would work now our standard precast concrete quotation or specification would say we need a 20-foot road path per OSHA around the building where the precast panels are going to be installed so that the precaster can install the panels off the truck onto the building without any undue handling so trucks we don't set precast product on the ground we pull the truck up next to the crane the crane picks the panel right off the off the truck hangs it right on the building if the truck has two or three pieces on it once those pieces are off the truck leaves another truck pulls up underneath the crane hook and the process continues on a typical I call it you know cornfield Ohio type project with no site constraints simple precast project I've seen people erect 12 15 even 20 panels a day on a on a you know an office building not a warehouse an office building where houses can get more so it goes very rapidly but the trucks all that logistics a precaster wants to look at early in design because it can affect your panel layout thank you Randy we have time for one more question is expansion of brick as it loses moisture over time of concern no so brick definitely expands brick spends its whole life expanding but it's at a very minimal rate and I think with the the joints in the panels movements accounted for and that's that's not an issue wonderful thank you so that concludes our Q&A portion of today's presentation on behalf of PCI I'd like to thank our speakers for another great presentation as a reminder certificates of continuing education will appear in your account at www.rcep.net within 10 days if you have any further questions about today's webinar please email marketing at PCI org thank you again have a great day and please stay safe

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manufacturing process

dimensional tolerances

thin brick

precast facades

clay brick

ASTM C1088 standard

PCI specification

thickness

face size

squareness

corner angles