U.S. Air Force installs Viega ProRadiant mat system
McGuire Air Force Base in southern New Jersey built a new 70,000-square-foot airplane hangar complete with a 1⁄2" Viega ProRadiant mat system. C Pyramid Enterprises of Trenton, NJ, built the new hanger. The McGuire Air Force Base project marks the first time C Pyramid Enterprises installed Viega mats but it probably won't be the last.
Eric Van Cleaf, Quality Control Manager for C Pyramid Enterprises, installed a different radiant system on their last project.
"The mats cut our installation time by at least a third," Van Cleaf said. "Three or four people have been working on installing it. Labor means a lot to us on a job like this, even more so than the cost of material, and we saved a lot of labor."
Van Cleaf has been especially pleased with the customer service he has received from Viega. While the mat's ease of installation was definitely the deciding factor in choosing to install it for this project, Van Cleaf stated that discovering the quality of Viega customer service was "a pleasant surprise".
"Every step of the way, they've helped out," Van Cleaf said. "The first design didn't go well because the architects had to move some things around. Viega actually redesigned the whole thing, even the placement of the manifolds. They worked hand-in-hand with the architects."
C Pyramid Enterprises is also using Viega ProPress to connect the mats to the 29 manifolds in the airplane hangar. At the end of the project, there were 85 mats installed under 12 inches of 650-Flex concrete, specifically designed to sustain the extreme weight of large military aircraft.
"It's meant for an airplane to go over it and not move at all," Van Cleaf said. "They got a lot of weight. All the weight is centralized on the wheels. That's what this is all designed for."
Van Cleaf appreciated the spacer strips and clips that come pre-attached to the mat to make sure that the tubing remains evenly spaced and aligned throughout installation.
