55 Water Street Elevator Repaired with V-Wrap™

55 Water Street is a 687-foot-tall office building located in New York City’s Financial District. Built in 1972, the existing elevator shaft was originally constructed with gypsum blocks and sections of the elevator walls began showing localized lateral movement as well as deterioration. This affected the fire rating of the elevator shaft and building along with the overall safety of the elevator car passengers and maintenance crews.

The original investigation survey of the elevator was conducted years prior to the actual execution of the repair work. While repairs took place, joint inspections with STRUCTURAL and the Engineer of Record took place for quicker identification of additional walls that needed to be strengthened.

To strengthen the elevator walls and prevent lateral displacement, STRUCTURAL installed STRUCTURAL TECHNOLOGIES’ V-Wrap™ externally bonded strengthening system. STRUCTURAL also performed masonry repointing, block replacement, block wall rebuilds, conduit chases, and various fireproofing repairs.

Temporary shutdowns of elevator cars spanned from one week to one month depending on the number of floors requiring strengthening. This project required a high level of effective field communication as well as inspections after the shift completed to ensure all installed material was in place for the tenants.

Daily job site analyses took place to document any safety related issues or hazards. A customized QA/QC plan was also developed and included FRP tensile pull-off tests that were completed and evaluated by the project team as well as a third party. These reports were submitted to the owner for documentation.

In total, STRUCTURAL worked on 86 elevator cars and installed over 60,000-square-feet of V-Wrap™ FRP. The project was successfully and safely completed on time.