Blog

Albina Co., Inc. recently rolled 16 pieces of 5/8" plate A36 to as tight as a 162" radius. Six pieces of plate were used as the inside stringers of a beautiful spiral staircase at Altar'd State at the Forum Shops at Caesar's Palace. Six pieces of plate were used as the outside stringers of the staircase, and four pieces were used on the landings. We bent the stringers, trimmed rectangular treat cut outs, trimmed to length, match paired plates, tacked them together and match drilled all holes. We bolt matched the plates together with a 6 bolts, (2) on the end, (2) in the middle, and (2) on the other end.

We also bent 2½" X 2½" X ¼" ANGLE A36 to help create the spiral staircase. Materials included:

1 piece leg in to a 25” inside radius.  Albina to bend 180° minimum.

1 piece leg out to a 162” inside radius.  Albina to bend 70” minimum arc.

1 piece leg out to a 30” inside radius.  Albina to bend 36” minimum arc.

1 piece leg out to a 19” inside radius.  Albina to bend 80” minimum arc.

1 piece leg in to a 38” inside radius.  Albina to bend 180° minimum.

Lastly, we bent one piece of Flat Bar 5/8" x 12" A36 UM Plate leg in to a 38” inside radius and 180° minimum.

We have to send another shout out to PDX Wraps for creating another custom wrap for our recent conference room makeover. PDX Wraps offers full service design, print and install for personal and commercial projects. They also offer products for paint protection, watercraft and other custom wraps. Earlier this year, we used PDX Wraps to wrap the exterior and interior of our brand new mezzanine lunch room. Such a cool product!

Albina bent 40,000# of steel for the Freyer-Newman Center, home to Denvers’ Botanical Gardens. Albina bent 60 pieces of W8 X 31# A992 the hard way to a full scale layout. We also bent Tube Steel 8" X 6" X .500" WALL A500 GR B the hard way and MC8 X 20# A36 the hard way. The Freyer - Newman Center is a LEED GOLD building, designed by Denver’s Davis Partnership Architects. The Center will house six classrooms; four galleries; new herbaria for vascular plants, mushrooms and slime molds; laboratories; a new library and a coffee shop, and is slated for completion this spring. Final install pictures coming soon!

Albina provided 109,000# of bent steel for the Eli Lilly San Diego Biotech Center in La Jolla, CA. Eli Lilly doubled the size of its research facility to 300,000 square feet during this project. Materials included: 8″ X 8″ X 5/8″ ANGLE A36- half of the parts rolled leg in and half of the parts rolled leg out. Tube Steel 8″ X 8″ X .500″ WALL A500 GR B 8 5/8″ OD X .625″ WALL A500B Wide Flange W16 X 57# A992- Split into WT8 and rolled some parts stem in and rolled some parts stem out. Wide Flange W24 X 103# A992- DOUBLE split to a finished height of 8¼” tall. Albina then rolled some parts stem in and other stem out.

Albina bent 45,000 lbs. of steel for the Chase Center- Home of the Golden State Warriors. Materials bent included Tube Steel 2" X 2" X .250" WALL A500 GR B, Tube Steel 14" X 14" X .500" WALL A500 GR B, Tube Steel 3" X 3" X .375" WALL A500 GR B, and Tube Steel 12" X 12" X .500" WALL A500 GR all bent to a 270 ft radius. The stadium is located in the Mission Bay area of San Francisco.

With every new year comes change and this new year we have a few announcements about some changes to our Albina team.

Albina elliptically bent 50,000# of 14" XH pipe, all material exposed, to extremely tight tolerances for the Wagon Creek Pedestrian Bridge in Mt. Shasta, California. The McConnell Foundation partnered with Siskiyou County by awarding a $600,000 grant for the Wagon Creek Bridge, and the bridge is considered the crown jewel of the Lake Siskiyou Trail.

We recently completed a unique curved stainless steel art project for Camelback Commons in Arizona. Albina Co., Inc. bent 8 pieces of 3" SCH40 T304 Stainless Steel. All parts were bent to a full scale layout and all points needed to be hit +/-½”. The tightest radius was a 36” centerline. Camelback Commons are multi-level buildings with an open atrium for businesses as well as apartments, just walking distance from the high-dollar Arizona Biltmore. Photo Credit: Creative Machines., Inc.

The National Council of Structural Engineers Associations (NCSEA) recently announced the 2019 Excellence in Structural Engineering Awards in the December issue of Structure Magazine. The Rufus 2.0 Spheres in Seattle, WA. Was awarded the “Outstanding Project” for New Buildings $20 Million to $100 Million. We worked with some of our amazing partners in the PNW on this project! Albina's portion included bending 750,000# and 1,050 pieces of rectangular tube steel bent the easy way and a portion bent off-axis for this project. Almost 8 miles of welding work and grinding was avoided because of Albina's ability to bend a portion of the project. Almost NO correction was needed during fabrication or erection as the bends fit to the fixtures within 1/32nd of an inch!

The color of the season around here is Red! Usually you wouldn't want to have the color red associated with a small business (ha!), but the signature red color we are seeing a lot of this season is our new DAVI MAV Variable Geometry K30 2-1/2” x 10 ft plate roll! The machine arrived in our shop a few weeks ago and will be up an operational by 12/31! This is our gift to you as this machine will drastically increase our capacity for plate rolling and we are excited about the opportunity to bid your plate rolling needs!
The overall capacity for standard A36 plate is 10 ft x 2½”. For higher yield material (example 60 ksi) the machine can pre-bend and roll the following examples:

1. 10 ft x 1 5/8″ thick to a 61″ outside diameter.
2. 9 ft x 1 3/4″ thick to a 96″ outside diameter.
3. 10 ft x 3/4″ thick to a 30″ inside diameter.

With 2019 wrapping up, we also wrap up our 80^th year in business. What an amazing accomplishment. Most businesses are not fortunate enough to see this type of longevity. 2019 has been a strong year for Albina where we have seen our national “footprint” expand into states where we were not previously providing bent materials. I think it is safe to say that Albina has a presence in almost every state in the US, which is a tremendous accomplishment for a company that started as a small, local shop. We would not be where we are at as a company without the efforts and dedication of the Albina team who strive to exceed your expectations in quality workmanship, on-time delivery, customer service, communication, equipment and procedures. We are so very fortunate for the amazing customers and vendors we work with as well. You make coming to work every day a pleasure. We are looking forward to 2020 and all the new opportunities and unique jobs we hope to work on together!