Does Your Choice of Scissor Lift Make a Difference?

12/03/2019

Picking the right mobile elevating work platform for the job can have a huge impact on safety, productivity, and the cost of the entire project. Contractors at Welty Building Company utilized an integrated project delivery (IPD) approach for the construction of the Akron Children's Hospital Considine addition, which led to completing the project 38 days early and saving $27 million. Read on to see how selecting low-level Hy-Brid Lifts helped them accomplish this.

Hy-Brid Lifts jobsite photo

What's Integrated Project Delivery?

Integrated project delivery, or IPD, is a revolutionary strategic planning approach that makes all partners – owners, contractors, and trade partners – stakeholders in a given project. Affected by the project outcome, each stakeholder earns a profit from project wins and shares in the cost of project failures. When implemented, the IPD process tends to drive down costs and foster teamwork and cooperation while speeding up each phase of the project.

For the Akron Children's Hospital, the IPD process incorporated an initial planning session, including the architect, engineers, contractors, and trade partners. The session pooled everyone's ideas and expertise to design the project and develop a plan for successful completion.

Initial project estimates totaled more than $100 million, but one of the benefits of an IPD approach is its ability to generate substantial cost savings in large-scale, multimillion dollar projects. The team reworked the plan, implemented new techniques, and brought the project within budget at a cost of $84 million.

"It's a win together teamwork mentality. In IPD, everyone from the architect to the trade partners recognizes that working for one common goal will result in a successful project, and more importantly, a happy customer."

Tom Conti
Welty Construction Company Senior Superintendent

Why Hy-Brid Lifts?

Due to the nature of the IPD process, jobsite planners decided to utilize only one equipment vendor. All Erection and Crane Rental Corp. provided all of the equipment for the jobsite, totaling 87 pieces of equipment, including 50 Hy-Brid Lifts. Tom Conti, Senior Superintendent, knew he needed compact and lightweight lifts that were versatile enough to complete almost all the at-height jobs the project required.

Hy-Brid Lifts seamlessly transitioned across the trades and applications on the hospital project from HVAC, electrical, and plumbing work to drywall and painting jobs. With platform heights between 10–14 ft and actual working heights of approximately 16–20 ft, the lifts were ideally sized for nearly every aspect of the project.

“Tom came to me asking specifically for Hy-Brid compact scissor lifts. The lifts offered the capacity for two workers but were still compact, lightweight, and easy to operate. Since all the different trades would share the lift, Tom and I knew Hy-Brid offered the ultimate versatility.”

Zac Kasparek
All Aerials Sales Representative

"With their ability to fit into tight spaces, such as through doorways and elevators, we experienced none of the damage typically seen with larger lifts. The lifts offered greater efficiency and were used from start to finish thanks to their maneuverability.”

Tom Conti
Welty Construction Company Senior Superintendent

The compact design of the Hy-Brid Lifts was an integral piece of the IPD approach and last-planner system that the team adopted for the hospital project, which allowed for simultaneous work in multiple areas of the project. With a lightweight, narrow, and maneuverable design, multiple units were able to work in the same zone at the same time, maximizing productivity while also minimizing any safety concerns or damage.

The project's overall success was the direct result of proper planning, choosing the right tools for the job, and teamwork.