GOMACO World Index --- GOMACO World 29.2 - June 2001
Bridge Work
Progressive Contractors Inc. (PCI) is a company based out of Michael, Minnesota, and specializes in concrete pavement, highway paving and bridge work.
"We do a lot of bridge barrier, curb, and median barrier," Jerry Ingman, senior vice president and secretary of PCI, said. "We do a lot of one bridge jobs all around the state. We might be in northern Minnesota one day and southern Minnesota the next with the same crew, so we're very mobile."
They needed a machine that was easy to transport and they turned to the new generation Commander III four track.
"We think it's easy to transport," Ingman said. "We have a trailer that's built special for it and pull it along with a dump truck."
One of the company's higher profile jobs was slipforming approximately 4000 feet (1219 m) of bridge parapet on two new bridges at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. One of the new bridges connected two concourses at the airport while the other was a return-to-terminal bridge. The parapet on that bridge had to be slipformed on a radius of less than 100 feet (30 m).
A special mold was built for the project, one that hydraulically articulates so they could slipform the radius without catching on the steel reinforcing. The parapet was slipformed 34 inches (864 mm) tall and the back of the wall had a seven inch (178 mm) overhang.
The parapet was given a vertical broom finish with joints edged in every 20 feet (6.1 m) and green sawed later.
"We like the power and size of our four-track new generation Commander III," Ingman said. "For our bridge barrier, it works the best."
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