Steel supports aviation manufacturing facility
Posted 12/1/2015
Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Aircraft Integration Center of Excellence in Building 100 in St. Augustine,
Fla., was designed to withstand wind speeds of 130 mph to comply with Florida's Building Code. The
center bay's 215­foot, clear­width, bottom­rolling sliding door was detailed to meet this requirement. A
bottom­rolling sliding door system was designed to run inside the clear opening of the door without any
roof overhang. Horizontal structural steel framing was designed to brace and transfer the load to the main
roof truss bottom chord level at 40 feet above the finished floor to support the 30­foot­high, bottom­
rolling sliding door system. Many high­bay door systems are designed to run outside of the clear opening
for the door with a large overhang of the roof framing system and a soffit. This is undesirable in a high­
wind zone.
FabArc Steel Supply Inc. supplied and fabricated steel for the 368,000­square­foot project. Phase one,
the high bay assembly area and support offices, was completed in May 2015. Phase two, the support
shop, is scheduled for completion in April 2016. Structural steel was specified to construct clear spans,
and for rapid fabrication and erection.
The structural frame has more than 10,000 pieces of steel weighing more than 5,200 tons connected with
100,000 high­strength bolts. The project utilized 220­foot steel trusses to span the center high bay and
85­foot steel trusses to span the north and south side bays. Each 220­foot­long by 28­foothigh steel truss
weighs more than 80 tons.
The high bay roof has 237,000 square feet of metal deck and the shop building roof has 72,000 square
feet of metal deck, topped with insulated standing seam panels supplied by Kingspan Insu­ lated Panels
Inc. Solar power is generated via a film applied to the IMP roof and the project team is pursuing LEED
Gold certification.
The design called for a 40­foot clear height above the finish floor. The long­span roof trusses were field­
assembled and erected with longreaching cranes due to tight job­site conditions. The space between the
220­foot truss bottom chord and the top chord was designed with eight platforms to house air­handling
units, distribution ductwork and maintenance access catwalks. Truss loading accommodates a 12­ton
overhead crane system in the 220­foot bay and 8­ton cranes in the 85­foot bays. Six under­hung bridge
cranes suspended from the bottom chord of the trusses were provided for complete coverage within the
high bay.
The exterior envelope was constructed with IMPs supplied by Kingspan Insulated Panels; hurricane
projectile­resistant exterior window glazing was installed at the office spaces.
Owner: Northrop Grumman Corp., St. Augustine, Fla.
Architect: The Austin Co., Irvine, Calif.
General contractor: The Austin Co., Atlanta
Steel supplier/fabricator: FabArc Steel Supply Inc., Oxford, Ala., www.fabarc.com
Metal roof panels: Kingspan Insulated Panels Inc., Deland, Fla., www.kingspanpanels.us