Contractor articles from February 2001

Contractor archives from February 2001

Utility buys Wenninger.(Exelon Enterprises )(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... MILWAUKEE -- Utility subsidiary Exelon Enterprises has bought one of the bigger names in mechanical contracting, 89-year-old Wenninger Co. here. Wenninger was ranked as the 92nd largest mechanical contractor in the nation last year in...

DOE calls for 13 SEER.(US Department of Energy's standards for air conditioners and heat pumps)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... WASHINGTON -- Outgoing Energy Secretary Bill Richardson announced Jan. 19 that central air conditioners will have to meet a minimum SEER of 13. The standard for heat pumps will rise to 13 SEER and 7.7 HSPF. The minimum efficiency requirements...

`Industry icon' E. Robert Kent leaves lasting legacy of service.(Poole & Kent Co.'s co-founder and Mechanical Contractors Association of America's leader dies)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
February 1, 2001... ANNAPOLIS, MD. -- E. Robert Kent, co-founder of The Poole & Kent Co. In Baltimore and a leader of the Mechanical Contractors Association of America, died here Dec. 30, 2000. Kent, 87, died of a stroke while at the Heritage Harbour Health...

Wastewater project emphasizes safety.(University Mechanical and Engineering Contractors to expand wastewater treatment plant, Phoenix, AZ)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
February 1, 2001... PHOENIX -- Already onsite completing a $15.5 million upgrade and expansion of a wastewater treatment plant, University Mechanical was tapped by the city of Phoenix for an additional $4.5 million worth of work on the facility's support systems....

Casey in, Peters out as PHCC-NA executive.
February 1, 2001... FALLS CHURCH, VA. -- The Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Contractors-National Association announced that effective Feb. 15 Dwight L. "Ike" Casey is its new executive vice president. He will replace Terry Peters who was named executive vice president...

Home Depot earnings decline.
February 1, 2001... ATLANTA -- The Home Depot has revised its outlook for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2000, which ended Jan. 28. Citing a "rapidly downward spiraling economic environment," the home-improvement retailer said it expects to report earnings of 20...

2000 housing growth easing off.
February 1, 2001... NOVEMBER 2000 total housing starts were at a seasonally adjusted annualized level of 1.56 million units, a surprisingly solid 2.2% increase from the October total. The pace of starts, however, in November 2000 was 6.1% lower than during...

Uplifting skills put to good use.
February 1, 2001... ST. LOUIS -- If equipment weighing tens of thousands of pounds needed hoisting in the past year here, chances are that crew members from Affton, Mo.-based mechanical contracting firm Haberberger Inc. were on the job. During 2000 the...

AirTime 500 up to 220 members in first year.
February 1, 2001... SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS -- If Jim Abrams and John Young have their way, the residential HVAC contracting industry will be hit by another -- and possibly longer lasting -- wave of change. About a year ago these two founders of consolidator...

New MCAA president: Training program starts at the top.
February 1, 2001... LAWRENCE, KAN. -- The most visible component of the manpower crunch faced by contractors is the shortage of field labor. But the shortfall extends to management personnel as well, said Smitty Belcher, incoming president of the Mechanical...

New ACCA president: Taylor wants to build bridge to the future.(Air Conditioning Contractors of America's Larry Taylor)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... FORT WORTH, TEXAS -- Larry Taylor's service technicians carry handheld computers to which the dispatcher transmits the data for a service call. The computers feature touch-screens, which the customer signs, and credit card swipe. The customer's...

IN BRIEF.(includes various information)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... * Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Contractors-National Association hired Lake A. Coulson as its new government relations director. He is the former director/legislative and regulatory affairs for the Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Institute. At...

CORRECTION.(to article about Uniform Building Code in Dec. 2000 issue)(Brief Article)(Correction Notice)
February 1, 2001... CORRECTION: A story in the December 2000 issue of CONTRACTOR (pg. 1) incorrectly stated that the Uniform Building Code is published by the International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials. The UBC was published from 1927 to 1997...

Design your trucks as cube billboards.(mechanical contractors)
February 1, 2001... NO ONE HAS ever accused me of not being able to stick with an opinion to the bitter end. My resolution for the New Year is to constantly remind you how I feel about a number of topics I believe to be indispensable to your efforts to maximize...

Texas contractor is new ABC president.(Austin Industrial's President/CEO Henry G. Kelly, Association Builders and Contractors)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... WASHINGTON -- Henry G. Kelly, president and CEO of Austin Industrial, Houston, has been elected to serve as a president for Association Builders and Contractors. His appointment was made effective Jan. 1st. ABC is a national construction...

LETTERS.
February 1, 2001... Safety measures help to protect contractors MORRISTOWN, N.J. -- This letter is in response to a recent column by Jim Wheeler (October 2000, pg. 24) that raised safety concerns about the use of 25-lb. disposable cylinders for R-410A, the...

Predictive maintenance goes beyond preventive.(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... I GOT A CALL from an old friend, Aaron York, a contractor out of Indianapolis. He had just read an article I wrote on preventive maintenance (July 2000, pg. 26), and he called to caution me that it shouldn't be called preventive maintenance...

HVACR Briefs.
February 1, 2001... EPA accepts SP34E as R-12 replacement SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ. -- Solpower Corp. announced that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency added refrigerant SP34E to the list of acceptable refrigerants under the Significant New Alternatives Program....

Tom's thumb.(mechanical contractor's expertise)
February 1, 2001... TOM PARKED his truck down the street from the McCabe's house and eyeballed the distance between him and the front door. He figured it was somewhere between 100 or 150 ft., give or take. Close enough, he thought. He opened the truck's door...

Explore control options for hydronic systems.
February 1, 2001... ALMOST EVERY hydronic contractor who reads this column probably has been doing his heating system controls the same way since he began doing hot water heating. I know I did. I did it the way I was shown by my mentors and, until recently, I...

RadPad sizes hydronic jobs.(radiant-floor system sizing calculator)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... LOVELAND, COLO. -- The new RadPad radiant-floor system sizing calculator is now available from the Radiant Panel Association. Developed by RPA Executive Director Larry Drake, this tool is intended to make radiant floor system sizing tasks quick...

Software estimates, designs HVAC systems.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
February 1, 2001... IN OUR LAST column we talked about PC-based software for managing projects (January, pg. 28). Here are some industry-specific PC software packages that save time and effort in designing and estimating residential and commercial HVAC projects....

Stop customer's bank from haranguing you?(mechanical contract financing)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... THE LARGER A project that you're performing for a customer, the greater the chance that the customer is borrowing the money for the building. Banks and other finance companies are willing to do this, but some of them -- increasingly more of...

Slant/Fin offers awards program.(boiler, heating contractors)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... GREENVALE, N.Y. -- Heating contractors' Slant/Fin boiler purchases can earn gifts and travel awards when they register for the Slant/Fin Boiler Awards program. Each boiler purchased under the program earns 3,000 points. Award points can be...

Your PM yardstick may not be 3 ft. long.(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... IN RESPONSE TO my December 2000 column about project management yardsticks (p. 46), Kevin Smith, a project manager in Greenville, S.C., wrote to me because he felt his responsibilities and productivity differed from my experience. I'd like to...

Industry information bureau ends its 81-year existence.(Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Information Bureau)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... CHICAGO -- The Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Information Bureau, founded in 1919 to be the consumer public relations arm of the industry, went out of existence as of Dec. 31, 2000. "The industry should miss PHCIB since it encompassed every...

Product SHOWCASE.
February 1, 2001... For more information please use the reader service card editor's CHOICE The Cornerstone line of faucets is designed for multifamily and hospitality applications. The line is ADA compliant and features ceramic disc cartridges for...

Take Brad Sell's advice and do yourself a favor.(Brief Article)
February 1, 2001... I FIRST MET BRAD SELL in 1990 at a regional wholesalers' convention in Boston. He was a manufacturers rep then and was leading a workshop on how New England wholesalers could increase their counter sales. He advocated self-service areas to the...