Photo of concrete slip pour in progress and completed safely and as planned on September 19, 2020. The contractor is FWS Group based in Winnipeg. Photos credit: FWS Group
G3 started construction on their state - of - the - art grain elevator in the County of Vermilion, just outside Vermilion in March of this year. The progress has been steady over the last few months with FWS Group as the overall General Contractor and Design Builder for the elevator. The company is also the Construction Manager for all the Civil Works including the rail and road design and construction.
The most prominent structure of the build thus far are the concrete silos, which were constructed in five and a half days.
“The process is called slip form construction or “Slip” for short. It involves the continuous pouring of concrete from the bottom to the top of the silos. As the concrete is poured into the forms and the lower half begins to cure a series of jacks lifts the form work up allowing us to place rebar and fill the top of the form again, this process is then repeated over and over. Once we lift off the form, work moves along (or slips) at a rate of approximately 1 foot/hour, 24 hours a day until the process is complete,” said FWS Group Managing Director Rori Bouchard.
Bouchard also went on to explain that the “Entire slip form activity requires roughly 3,000 cu yards of concrete and a half million pounds of rebar, all of which is entirely placed by hand.”
Bouchard also stated that he has to give a big hats off to all their crews on the slip for tackling such a challenging task while having to deal with the added stress of the global COVID-19 pandemic.
“They are all second to none,” said Bouchard who also added “To give some perspective 3,000 yards of concrete equates to roughly 10,000 wheel barrels pushed while 1.5 million pounds of rebar equates to roughly 35,000 pieces of rebar carried and tied into place.”
According to Bouchard once the facility is complete and able to receive their first loads of grain in June of 2021 the concrete silo’s will be able to hold approximately 17,500 Metric Tons of grain, and an additional 25,000 Metric Tons of grain inside the steel tanks.
“The total capacity will be 42,500 Metric Tons which is equivalent to roughly 1.5 Million bushels,” said Bouchard.