Pushing the Envelope: Engineers, contractors urge owners to take closer look

Two years ago, Miller Engineering PC started noticing a problem among clients.

Shortly after Melissa Payne came on board in 2014 with her specialty in building envelope services, the company’s forensic engineering work began to increase. More contractors were calling with building issues – mold, stained ceiling tiles, window leaks and rooms not holding temperature – and turning to the firm to identify the sources.

“We’re doing 15 forensic evaluations a week, locally,” founder and president Travis Miller said. “That’s how bad the envelope problems are in our area.”

Miller said a building’s envelope, aka enclosure, constitutes elements that keep weather out, whether it’s a roof, walls or membranes underneath slab, and foundations. Discovering that many of the problem spots could have been addressed during construction or pre-emptively in the design phase, Miller Engineering added a third division – business envelope consulting.

While the service adds to a project’s budget, Payne said it’s intended to save money and headaches on the back end for the owner and the contractor.

“The reason (contractors) see the value is if it’s not constructed right, they’re the ones that get the call backs,” said Payne, a forensic investigator. “They’re spending a lot of employees’ time and funds to send people back to buildings they’ve already built.”

Miller said an unnamed general contractor informed him the company spends an average of $40,000 coming back to fix problems after completion – money that comes out of the firm’s profits under typical contractor warranties. Payne pointed out owners also lose revenue if they have to close down a building or room for additional repairs. When owners aren’t satisfied with the final product they may take their grievances to court to determine if building failure was a result of design or construction.

“The thing with an envelope failure is some things take time to develop before anyone notices,” Miller said. “Then they call somebody, and by the time you’re seeing cracks, it’s usually much worse than you imagined – what’s hiding behind the drywall.”

Stress factors
A recent example of Miller Engineering’s building envelope work is Prime Inc.’s $50 million expansion at 2740 N. Mayfair Ave.

During construction, Miller Engineering and roofing subcontractor Flynn Midwest LP were brought in by general contractor Killian Construction Co. to examine the envelope.

“Prime was a good example where the owner didn’t buy into that at first, and the general contractor requested third-party intervention,” said Rebecca Welsh, branch manager for Flynn Midwest’s Springfield office. “We had a building envelope meeting up front and spent a day walking through it. Hopefully, the owner will see the value in the end.”

Welsh said the industry often puts building envelope considerations behind design and energy efficiencies.

“The envelope is like the skin of the building – it breathes and it’s dynamic,” she said. “If we start to think of buildings like that, it changes how we design and construct them.”

With the building supply market bringing an influx of new materials, Payne said knowledge of how the products work together, such as the chemical interactions between water or air barriers and cladding, is key in the planning stages.

“Most of those products are never seen because what we deal with is not exposed,” Payne said. “Once they’re covered, it’s difficult to inspect them.”

A former project manager for DeWitt & Associates Inc., Welsh said the ideal method for addressing building envelope is cooperative communication between owners, architects, general contractors and subcontractors.

“General contractors rely on subcontractors to be experts in the field,” Welsh said. “A lot of times they are, and sometimes they aren’t. The idea is for us to take more liability and risk away. Instead of multiple people touching the exterior, there is one.”

The challenge is convincing owners the cost of bringing on additional third-party support is worthwhile.

“They want to know what it’s going to cost and have to weigh that,” Welsh said. “You have to be able to drive that value to the owner and show them, ‘If you don’t spend more on this, then here’s what can happen in one to 10 years.’”

Consulting costs
Miller Engineering’s full consultation – from design through preparing a repair and maintenance program and a 10-month warranty walkthrough – costs roughly 55 cents per square foot.

Payne said the firm assisted with renovation work at the Camden County Courthouse in Camdenton and a historical restoration of the Cayuga Mission Church in Grove, Okla. It’s also targeting new structures.

“If you have a building you want to last for 30 to 50 years – government, for example – those kinds of buildings, they see a little more value,” Welsh said, also pointing to schools and hospitals. “A strip mall or a retail center – if it’s going to get demolished in 10 years, they don’t necessarily care as much.”

Miller also identified city and county inspections as a place where building envelope features need more scrutiny. He added Miller Engineering has performed some presentations on its forensic findings for city of Springfield staff, and the effort is generating interest for adding building envelope concerns to the inspection process.

“We’re saying, ‘Let’s get ahead of that rather than be caught flat-footed,’” Miller said, noting other municipalities and states require air barriers and other features to be considered in building codes. “They see the writing on the wall that it’s coming.”