I spent the last week of January in Las Vegas at World of Concrete | World of Masonry | Technology for Construction.

The masonry industry had representation from all parts of the wall system (wire tie manufacturers, insulation, mortar and more) to support (mortar boards, scaffolding and estimating software). The exhibit hall was alive with new products, improved methods, renewed enthusiasm for the construction season ahead.

The Mason Contractors Association of America (MCAA), which has its annual conference at World of Masonry, shared their achievements of 2011 and laid out plans for 2012 and beyond. Under the leadership of now Past President Mackie Bounds, the MCAA has worked at bringing the industry together for the benefit of all. Their program, Vision 20/20 arms mason contractors with tools they need to advocate for more masonry planning policies and design guidelines in municipalities, cities and counties. They have joined with NCMA and MIM to present masonry’s case to the Department of Defense for military housing facilities and are working on creating life cycle assessments and cost analysis for masonry as compared to other structural systems.

In promoting masonry systems, they also realize the importance of continuing the education and cultivating the expertise of mason contractors. Between their work force development committee, education committee and membership committee, they are working toward that goal. Currently, 49 contractors nationwide are pursuing MCAA contractor certification by taking coursed from 30 approved providers. The organization is considering national sponsorship of National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER) for standardized and rigorous curricula for training programs. Additionally, a new membership category has been developed for students.

Masonry skill and craftsmanship was on display in the many live demonstrations held during the week. MCAA sponsored two events: International Masonry Skills Challenge and the Fastest Trowel on the Block Competition. The Skills Challenge had first-, second- and third-year apprentices competing to produce a brick and block “wall” appropriately designed to their experience level. The catch is they are not shown the design until the start of the competition, then they are given three hours to produce the design.

MCAA Masonry Skills Challenge First Year Contestant Justin Proch of Leidal & Hart Mason Contractors earned third place in his division. Here with Jake Broder of Leidal & Hart, BAC Local 1 Instructor Tom Ward (left) and Elmer Dixon of Dixon Masonry (right).

Fastest Trowel is a block-laying competition comprised of teams of one mason and two tenders who must complete as much of an 18-block long wall in 20 minutes as possible, using 8”x8”x16” CMU and mortar. According to the MCAA, the competition “promotes craftsmanship, speed and versatility of masonry systems and the masonry workforce.”

The crème de la crème of masonry competitions, however, is the Spec Mix Bricklayer 500, which celebrated its 10^th year this year in Las Vegas. Twenty-one bricklayer/tender teams have one hour to lay as many brick as possible in a double wythe 26’8” wall. Winners are selected after intense judging, where quality and craftsmanship are factored in as well as the number of brick laid. SpecMix has secured dedicated sponsors for this event, which is really a not-to-be-missed live entertainment event in the Gold Lot outside the Convention Center. Product demonstrations, t-shirt cannons, audience participation games and activities and, this year, a special appearance by Godfather of Freestyle Motorcross, Mike Metzger, courtesy of Bosch, kept the live crowd and online viewers entertained while the brick walls grew, then were judged. Contestants for this event must qualify regionally. In 2011, 16 regional qualifying competitions were held throughout the US and Canada. This year’s event saw contestants from Australia and England as well.

Winners of the 2012 SPEC MIX Bricklayer 500 National Bricklaying Championship. From left: Toughest Tender Nick Miller from Exteriors Plus in Jefferson WI; tender Aaron Cooke with third place winner Justin Jakubisin from Giambrone Masonry in Hudson OH; tender Gustavo Soriano with “World’s Best Bricklayer”, first place winner Leif Reints with Reints Masonry in Neosho, MO; Top Craftsman winner Scott Tuttle of Quik Trowel Masonry, Clearfield UT with tender Brian Tuttle; second place winner Filipe Orfao of Squire Masonry, Cookstown ON with tender Manuel Oliveira.

Jim O’Connor, executive secretary at Mason Contractors Association of Greater Chicago, provides color commentary during the SPEC MIX Bricklayer 500

Jim DiGiovanni, Spec Mix sales manager of Quikrete Companies for Southeast Michigan, participated again this year as a Mudslinger at the SPEC MIX Bricklayer 500, supplying competitors with plenty of fresh mortar.

New this year was Masonry Veneer Live, an area of the exhibit hall dedicated to cast stone, natural stone, brick and adhered veneer masonry. Versatility, artistry and craftsmanship were on display, while partnering associations, Brick Industry Association, Cast Stone Institute and Masonry Veneers Manufacturers Association provided training demonstrations. After all, it is the beauty of masonry that first attracts admirers. Fortunately, enough exhibiters were on hand to inform and educate attendees about the depth and breadth of all of masonry’s inherent attributes.

Here’s to a great 2012!

In Dubai, money really does seem to grow on trees. But instead of trees, construction cranes are filling the skyline.  What only a generation ago was known primarily as a trade port of call, is now a global city and now boasts some of the most compelling architecture being built today. Dubai is home to the largest mall in the world, as well as the tallest building in the world.

Their construction boom has quickly illuminated a concern that their government intends to resolve through code changes: glass buildings are too inefficient.

In fact, glass buildings are proving to be the biggest challenge to sustainability, said Environmental and Sustainability Planning representative for the Abu Dhabi Department of Municipal Affairs, Matthew Plumbridge at the Construction Week Building Sustainability into the Middle East Conference. The heavy cost of cooling glass areas, especially in hot countries, is a great challenge and forcing the development of HVAC systems to keep up.

He continued, saying that Abu Dhabi’s new energy code will limit the amount of fenestration in buildings. Going forward, Abu Dhabi will be constructed of building materials that will hold long-term value and improve energy efficiency and sustainability.

What a directive!

Closer to home, numbers from McGraw Hill Construction indicate that “green building” has maintained a fairly steady pace of construction right through the current economic downturn. When buildings like the University of Chicago’s Business Instructional Facility are operating with energy costs 51% better than budget, investing in new structures is less daunting to owners because of the long-term savings.

University of Illinois Business Instructional Facility. Image courtesy of the College of Business at ILLINOIS

The design team for the Business Instructional Facility demonstrated the benefit to maintaining an opaque envelope to fenestration ratio of 80%-20% to be significant and designed the building accordingly. In this case, a well-insulated masonry cavity wall provided the opaque portion of the envelope.

The university didn’t ask for that ratio. At the time, campus had no LEED certified buildings. Many buildings were 100 years old and operating on steam heat. The architect and design team brought this to the client. As such, the building is well above code minimum for wall R-value and is extremely energy efficient.

On the other hand, other designers are suggesting and creating buildings for clients that are largely glass. No matter how hard they try, no matter how expensive and high tech the glass, the building cannot be truly energy efficient. Hot climate, like Abu Dhabi, or no. 

Should the days of glass buildings be behind us now? Is energy conservation more important than an unobstructed view? Can fewer, but carefully placed windows be as effective in providing daylighting­­­­­­­, connection with the outdoors and “lightness of design”, while still allowing an opaque building envelope to help insulate and regulate heating and cooling needs? 

From an article on msnbc.com today, Irene reveals more cracks in Washington Monument, “[Carol Johnson, a Park Service spokeswoman for the National Mall and Memorial Parks,]

said that a majority of the cracks are in the mortar between the monument's stones, which is designed to take the wear-and-tear and spare the stone itself.

Johnson added that a few stones have been cracked.

Cracks in Washington Monument from August 2011 Earthquake. Credit: National Park Service

The NPS and engineers are going back to compare current damage to past records for the monument.”

Washington National Cathedral after the earthquake. Credit: Washington National Cathedral, Craig Stapert, photographer

The Washington Monument is one of several significant masonry structures along the east coast damaged as a result of August’s earthquake and/or hurricane. The National Cathedral is another. In each article I read about the aftermath, I always look for, and usually find, a sentence that goes something like this: “Still, Johnson says the monument is structurally sound and ‘not going anywhere.’”

That’s the kind of great news on which the masonry industry relies about its structures. They’re built to handle some abuse but, like Timex watches, they can “take a licking, but keep on ticking”.

(It’s not just “national treasures”, either. Hundreds of homes and small commercial buildings were likewise affected. In each case, masonry structures fared better than its timber/siding counterparts. Problems like damaged flooring and broken windows are always a better scenario than building collapse.)

I was also particularly pleased to read that the National Mall and Memorial Parks team was able to consult past records for the monument to compare to current damage. I hope that, like the Beaubien House, a historic building featured in the current issue of Masonry Edge/theStoryPole, they have records of the kind of mortar used on the monument and the recipe for making more. Maintaining records of past repairs and future maintenance needs can be extremely beneficial when urgent repairs are called for and for budgeting maintenance into operating expenses. Not only is maintaining records good for the wallet, it is good for the structure, both inside and out. A bad patch job is a bad patch job. Even if it seals the cracks and mitigates water migration into the structure, it looks bad, which detracts from the beauty and, potentially, the value of the structure.

Our thoughts go out to all of those affected by the earthquake and hurricane and hope clean up and repair can happen quickly, safely and in such a manner to continue to beautifully serve and preserve the structure for years to come. 

I tip my hat to inventors and innovators who continuously look for ways to make things better. There is always room for improvement, but there are plenty of instances of movements or specific products introduced to market that were “better” than the one that came before, only to be put back in their place over time. This goes well beyond New Coke, too. Gardening has seen resurgence with a whole new generation of people whose parents shopped for produce, brought in from all around the world, at grocery stores, but whose grandparents picked what was in season from their back yards. Today’s grocery stores tout aisles in their produce sections of locally-grown produce, often even naming the farms from which things come, bringing back that close to home, seasonal feel.

The built environment has gone away from and come back to operable windows. Once upon a time, they were the only way to cool an interior space, and then there were decades when it was thought best to mechanically regulate interior air and windows were for “looking only.” That has changes again and operable windows are back in good graces.

That’s not all though.

In his article “Old Buildings Combine Sustainability, Preservation”, John McKinney for Miller-McCune references US Department of Energy research on the energy performance of existing buildings, which “ascertained that commercial buildings constructed before 1920 use less energy per square foot than buildings from any other period of time except after 2000. Older buildings, it seems, were constructed with high thermal mass, passive heating and cooling. And, obviously, were built to last.”

Really?

Guess what materials were used to construct buildings before 1920. Masonry. Multiwythe masonry. Multiwythe masonry that was designed to account for natural elements like temperature changes and rain, yet still provide effective and efficient structure and enclosure.

Today, the guts of a masonry wall have changed to reflect technological advancements and the walls still benefit from the same added value as pre-1920: high thermal mass, passive heating and cooling capability and long life. Today they aren’t ultrathick, rather engineered to be only about 16”, not 6’ like Chicago’s Monadnock Building. And they’re even more energy efficient, thanks to revolutionary products like insulation, which wasn’t even invented and used until closer to the mid-20^th Century.

The beauty of masonry is so much more than its beauty. It is its added value. In the current issue of MasonryEdge/theStoryPole, masonry’s added value abounds. Its fire safeness, especially for stairwells. Its durability and long-life were the reason it was chosen for two featured university residence hall projects and the reason an AIA chapter has its office in a 150 year-old urban residence. Its ability to reduce the number of materials required for a job provided the added value to the budget and schedule of several new Detroit Public Schools.

In the next issue, we’ll take a look at how thermal mass is considered in determining a building’s Effective R-value. Energy efficiency isn’t about achieving a single number; it’s about performance. Masonry performs.

The building community relied on and trusted masonry once. There are a lot of reasons why it’s time they should be again.

It's an interesting challenge for the masonry industry: to make sure that humankind's oldest building method, arguably, doesn't become antiquated in its design and construction practices.

Brick and block may still be laid one over two, but little else has remained as simple.

Hand-drawn design plans have given way to computer-generated 3D building simulations. Calculating structural specifications can now be done in a fraction of the time it took to do "by hand" using structural engineering software programs. Mechanical software can take into account masonry's thermal mass when designing mechanical system needs of buildings. Mason contractors generate estimating take-offs in minute electronically and can also create 3D models, then export those models into general contractors'/construction managers' BIM software programs, potentially eliminating clashes and job site issues before they happen. (See Christian Kott and Bill Pacetti's article in MasonryEdge/the StoryPole volume 6 number 1 to learn more.) Brick manufacturers have interactive web sites on which different brick and mortar colors and bond patterns can be modeled for best aesthetics at the earliest stages of conceptualizing design.

And it goes on.

There is virtually no aspect of the industry untouched by technological advances. Including MasonryEdge/the StoryPole, which has gone from being a print-only magazine to an online resource, with a digital edition, but now also a blog (which you've already found!) and bonus material—editorial to supplement the magazine content. You can also keep with us on Facebook and LinkedIn.

In the current issue, volume 6 number 1, Kyle Lochonic explains some of the key changes made to MIOSHA's Part 2 Masonry Wall Bracing Construction Safety Standard. Required in Michigan, its concepts are thorough, yet clear and concise enough to be considered a best practice around the country. Thanks to online learning programs, mason contractors from Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon can take the same training and ensure the same quality of safety standards. (See Michele O'Neil's Bonus Material article Construction Safety Training in the 21st Century.)

Masonry is an art. A true craft, but in 2011, don't rely on that to be enough. Find ways to let technology work for you to so that you are sure to get the most out of masonry, in whichever segment of the industry you are positioned.