Career Episode 2

CAREER EPISODE: 2

CE2.1 Introduction:

Chronology: Project duration from January 2012 to March 2013

Geographical Location: Sukkur - Pakistan
Organization: Expertise (Private) Limited.
My Position: Planning Engineer
Project: Construction of 200 Bed Surgical Hospital, Sukkur.

Background:

CE2.2 This career episode is based on my job as Planning Engineer at Expertise

(Private) Limited (EPL). The name of the project was “Construction of 200 Bed
Surgical Hospital, Sukkur.” and the client organization was Worker Welfare Fund,
responsible for overlooking and managing the whole project. My position in the
organization is demonstrated in the Organizational chart for the project.

CE2.3 EPL had been awarded a project in January 2012, in Sukkur, by the name of
“Construction of 200 Bed Surgical Hospital, Sukkur”. Worker Welfare Fund
(WWF), the owner of the building had planned to build a modern hospital in
Sukkur as the existing Civil Hospital was fully saturated. A large number of
workers had reported at the Civil Hospital, Sukkur, for medical attention in 2010,
and a significant number of these patients required burn treatment and trauma
counseling. Mortality rate for such cases was on the high side. Considering the
severity of this condition and to prevent loss of life, there was a need to provide
modern health facilities in the city and to cater for medical needs especially of
workers of the project area.

CE2.4 The general objective of the project was to provide the modern health facilities to
the workers and their families living in that area which was estimated two
hundred thousand registered and unregistered industrial and commercial workers
in and around the project area who faced an acute shortage of healthcare

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facilities. Accordingly, the project conceived to provide modern medical facilities

for workers and their families.

CE2.5 During this project I was assigned many duties. As a planning engineer I had to
plan and manage the resources provided on site in effective way. Prepared and
submitted daily and monthly progress reports, planned tasks to achieve progress
and satisfaction of the stake holders. Also I have to verify the technical submittal
as per contract and specification. I used to Guide the team in difficult situations.
Perform Quality control in order to meet customers’ expectations. Provide
solution for both the technical and non-technical problems. Collect and Archive
data for actual work performed in Organization Process assets. Record lessons
learned during the Project life cycle and Archive in Organization Process assets
to improve the quality of work and prevention of similar mistakes in Future.

Organizational Chart:

DIRECTOR TECHNICAL
Asif Raza Mirza

DIRECTOR
Taimur Asif Mirza

Senior Project Manager

Malik Saeed

Planning Engineer
MUHAMMAD UMAIR KHAN

Quantity Surveyor
Kamran Ali

Support Team

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Personal Workplace Activity

CE2.6 I was deployed as a planning engineer for Planning, Execution, Monitoring and
Controlling, Closing for the casting of bored piles which was suggested by the
management consultant LWI as per the geotechnical condition of site at Sukkur.
Director Technical gave me the responsibility for both planning and execution at
site especially for pile foundation.

CE2.7 Pile foundation is commonly used where soil upper strata is very weak and
ground water level is very high and heavy loading is to be transferred to the soil,
where deep excavation is to be done and are also used to retain the lateral earth
pressure of soil. The main advantage of doing this project was to learn
application of Civil Engineering knowledge and Management skills from academic
to professional life. I studied and applied the knowledge of Soil Mechanics,
Concrete Technology and Engineering Management. I used ASTM standards for
testing piles under different loading condition particularly in compression (D1143)
and tension (D3689).

CE2.8 In initiation, I studied the literature about the concept of bored piles, design of pile
foundation, drilling and casting specification. I also studied ASTM standards for
testing of piles foundation like ultrasonic crosshole testing (ASTM: D6760), pile
under static axial compressive load (ASTM: D1143) and Sonic integrity test
(ASTM: D5882).

CE2.9 For planning phase, I planned how to execute the project smoothly and without
any problem. For this I planned all the required resources, how much no of piles
to be casted, testing and handling of the site works. Before the start of
construction phase, I carried out four pile load test to verify designer’s data and
their calculation for pile diameter, length and reinforcement detail.

CE2.10 The pile was tested by using a Kentledge system. In this test, I recorded
settlement by means of three dial gauges calibrated in mm. There were two cyclic
loading, in first cycle 259 tons load was weighed down and then in second cycle
335.5 tons load was weighed down and then subsequent unloading was done up-

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to zero load. The test load was sustained for 12 hours after which the load was
removed.

CE2.11 From the test I confirmed that design diameter and length of the piles were
satisfactory to carry load from superstructure building to foundation safely. As per
design pile diameter was 780mm and length was 27m. The design working load
was 259 ton. I followed many ASTM standards to confirm pile load test results
which were ASTM: D1143, D1586, and D3689.

CE2.12 After pile load test, I proceeded to planning schedule of the project especially for
pile work. To prepare the perfect and authentic schedule, I studied the tender
documents, technical specifications and Bill of Quantities (BOQ). Also I did
productive brain storming with my site team and my conclusion was; that we have
to cast 1150 number of Load Bearing Piles over the period of six months. All the
piles were Bored cast in-situ concrete piles with diameter 780mm and length
27m.

CE2.13 I divided my whole site into four zones and assigned four different teams which
consist of foreman, helpers and Rig machine. I estimated that in order to achieve
the target in six months, my team have to work for 26 days a month for 12 hours,
then I can bored 10 piles per day. According to the schedule which I prepared, I
can finish the piling works in five months. In the last month still I can do working
pile load testing which was mentioned in specification. Further, I handed over the
site to other team after cutting pile tops.

CE2.14 During execution phase, I carried out the mobilization of resources as per the
plan which I had taken approval from the client. At the start of each day, I carried
out TSTI (Total Safety Task Instruction), in this session I gave instructions to my
team about the importance of HSE (Health, Safety, Environment) and informed
them about the daily planned activities. My main focus was to get the daily
progress under healthy HSE conditions.

CE2.15 During execution, first stage was drilling of piles, as I already know from the
Standard Penetration Test (ASTM: D 1586) and soil investigation report that the

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soil strata below is Silty Sand so I used casing up to 3.0 m length. Until ground
water table encountered, I selected Auger Drilling method for its faster results.
After ground water table, I changed to Bucket Drilling because of its advantage
over Auger Drilling method in preventing soil collapse. I filled the hole completely
with bentonite slurry to create a counter pressure to ground water pressure and
prevent collapsing of the bore hole; it results in reinforcing the soil. Steel cages
length was kept around 1.0 m more than pile drill length because of the reason
that sufficient length of steel reinforcement above the pile head level is needed
for the strong development length between piles and pile caps.

CE2.16 I used trimie pipe for the casting of the piles. Before I started, I placed a plastic
ball of diameter slightly less than trimie pipe in order to separate the bentonite
slurry present in drill borehole from fresh concrete. I got this idea during a
seminar attended in a topic of “Pile Construction” during the construction of this
project. During the casting of piles I kept the slump of concrete a bit high (b/w
175-225 mm) due to the fact that compaction of concrete cannot be done along
the pile length and keeping slump higher will cause concrete to self-compact
under its own weight. In order to check the quality of concrete casted, I tested
and checked 28 days cube specimen (B.S 1881) strength results against
specified strength of the concrete mix used for casting.

CE2.17 As Pile concreting is a complex process compare to the normal concreting so

proper attention is to be paid while the process of concreting is going on. I have
taken the knowledge from my academic background and used admixture in the
concrete to avoid segregation of concrete, trimie blockages, suspension of
foreign materials in to the pile concrete, etc, So to overcome such problems I
revised the design mix by using the different admixtures, GGBS (Ground
Granulated Blastfurnace Slag) and fly ash.

CE2.18 All the piles were casted in the same method and I reported the daily progress to
my Management and weekly to management consultant and client engineers by
Bore Pile record sheets. It includes pile number, date of casting of pile, start and
finish drill time, drill length, average natural surface level, cut-off level, soil strata
information after every 2.0 m depth by using method of visual inspection (ASTM

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D2488), steel reinforcement details, concrete starting and finishing time, length of
steel cage and concrete slump during casting.

CE2.19 I verified the soil strata during visual soil inspection ASTM: D2488 with soil
investigation report submitted to Expertise (Private) Limited before pile
foundation. It was the same strata mentioned in report i.e Silty Sand. It consist of
fine grained soils which contains more than 50% fines.

CE2.20 I carried out strong monitoring and controlling from the start of the project, it
involved quality control and testing. I done Bentonite testing to check the Density,
Liquid limit, Sand content, Silt content, PH value and Flow rate. I had performed
these tests daily, In density test the range is 1.03 to 1.11 g/ml and if the value
comes above or below this range then I recommend to increase the percentage
of bentonite in slurry, In sand content test I checked the amount of sand present
in the sample, if the sand content is less than 7% then the test is pass otherwise I
reject the use of bentonite for drilling purpose.

CE2.21 During PH value test I used litmus paper to test the PH of the bentonite slurry; its
passing range is from 9 to 11.5 PH. Finally I checked the flow rate which is called
Marsh viscosity of the bentonite slurry, the flow rate ranges from 30 sec/litre to 60
sec/litre if the value is less, than quantity of bentonite is increased and if the value
is more, than the quantity of bentonite is decreased. I recorded these results in
bore pile record sheet for each pile. Also I did some pile load tests on working
piles as per the instruction of management consultant.

CE2.22 In closing, I had done breaking of the top 1 M of muddy concrete and exposed
the dowel steel bars for all the piles. I ordered a Hydraulic cutter and attached it
with the Excavator to cut the top 1 M of pile top. My decision expedites the
breaking process. I completed 50 Piles / day and achieved my target in due
course successfully. Before the closure of the project I had completed the
assigned targets of Pile casting, Testing and breaking successfully. I started
demobilization of manpower and machinery for their effective use on other
project. My goal was to achieve the costumer’s satisfaction which I achieved
successfully.

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CE2.23 During Execution phase, one day while drilling activity was going on, and the
drilling depth was 27 m the bore starts collapsing, I immediately stopped the
drilling and filled the bore with bentonite slurry, yet the collapsing continues
slowly, I went to bentonite plant and checked bentonite slurry’s density and flow
rate, I noticed that foreman supplied immature bentonite for drilling, I ordered him
to give 24 hours after mixing bentonite with water during this time bentonite
completely swells. Bore hole was filled with soil and then re drilled after 7 days.
During the complete Execution phase collapsing of bore hole was not
encountered again.

CE2.24 At the start of project while concreting the piles consumes 28 m3 of concrete
which was less than the theoretical concrete quantity of pile. I suggested to check
the dimensions of drilling tools like bucket, auger and casing. After inspection it
was found that the diameter of casing was 780 mm and that of drilling bucket was
700 mm due to which the bore diameter becomes less than 780 mm throughout
the 27M length of pile due to which overall concrete consumption reduces. I
ordered the manufacturer to prepare new tools with accurate dimensions and
then tested them on one pile; the concrete consumption came 33 m3 which was
accurate practically.

CE2.25 One of the problems that I faced while executing this project was that during the
drilling procedure some piles were collapsing even after applying counter water
pressure to ground water. I suggested the solution to use full casing throughout
the length of pile to reduce collapsing of soil strata as it braced the pile
completely against seeping ground water pressure.

CE2.26 I noticed during the construction phase about Pile movements due to soil
displacement from adjacent pile driving. I decided to include re-driving of installed
piles, change in sequence of pile installation, or predrilling of pile locations to
reduce ground movements. Lateral pile movements could also result from
adjacent slope failure.

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CE2.27 Due to a lot of paper work involved I was aware it was important for me to
maintain a proper record of all the documents. For this purpose I used state of
the art software, Primavera Contract Management, to maintain and keep record
of all the conversations, meetings, correspondence, letters etc. while I maintained
all the record in hard copy as file, filed in proper way. Thus any information no
matter how old was available within click of a button.

Summary:

CE2.28 This project provided me with a valuable experience in Initiating, Planning,

Executing, Monitoring & Controlling and Closing of a project. I expanded my
knowledge throughout my employment period and enjoyed my work as I was
taming my profession skills and Engineering knowledge for future tasks. This
occupation period induce self-confidence in me and given me great chance to
polish leadership skills as I was handling all technical matters solely with effective
management skills.

CE2.29 I had a wonderful experience of putting my theoretical knowledge of engineering

into practice. I achieved the project aims within stipulated time which shows my
commitment and sense of responsibility.