PREVENT
Clean, Inspect, Maintain, Repeat.
A proactive cadence of seasonal cleaning, inspection, maintenance, and asset management actions will keep your buildings resilient and protected.
Fight Back Against Extreme Weather
The building envelope is under constant attack from the elements. Ever changing weather conditions, some extreme, grind away year after year slowly degrading even the most robust materials, including slate. Once components are weakened, moisture intrudes into substructures causing impairment that often goes undiscovered further compromising the overall system. This can result in major leaks, material breakage and expensive damage to property and assets. Some failures may even lead to personal injury of building users and staff.
Most owners and property managers handle existing building envelope systems using a reactive approach that is based on quickly responding to failure events after they have happened. This entails exclusively repair and replacement services with limited or no periodic inspection, assessment, maintenance, or preventative services.
But constantly reacting to problems drains resources and distracts attention from other organizational priorities. It also demoralizes staff who end up feeling like they are running in place, never quite catching up to an always growing list of facility failures.
The Cost of a Reactive Approach
Greater focus on preventive actions reduces the risk and cost of expensive failures. This is best illustrated by the 1-10-100 Rule which applies in many industries including construction and building services. Essentially, the rule states that prevention is less costly than correction is less costly than failure.
Our key program component is a greater focus on prevention & correction (the 1:10:100 Rule).
An Easy Solution
There is a simple, proven strategy to reduce the risk of untimely building envelope system failures: periodic, vigilant inspection combined with proactive cleaning and maintenance services.
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The transition from a reaction contracting routine to a more proactive method is not difficult. You can achieve a better balance between repair/replacement actions and inspection, maintenance and cleaning activities.
WS Aiken has developed a suite of proactive services that pay for themselves several times over by extending asset life and reducing the risk of expensive property damage.
Defender Shieldâ„
A periodic & pre-scheduled service that includes Cleaning, Inspection & Maintenance of building envelope systems/components.
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Cleaning is typically performed seasonally to:
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Remove organic materials from roofs, gutters, drains, downspouts, etc.
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Remove snow and ice, if needed
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Keeping roofs and drainage systems free of debris reduces damage to building surfaces, inhibits mold and unwanted plant growth, minimizes clogging and also enables field technicians to better perform inspections.
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Inspections are then performed to:
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Survey and document the condition of building envelope systems and components using a proprietary field software application that streamlines and automates the data collection process
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Collect, catalog and track survey information in the WS Aiken SURESightâ„ database for asset management and decision-making purposes
SURESightâ„ Database Aerial Roof Map example
Maintenance work is performed during each scheduled service visit and focuses on repairing small deficiencies that can be immediately fixed. For example field technicians may patch small holes in an EPDM roof, caulk open seams, replace a broken slate tile or wood shingle, fix a bracket, install new flashing etc.
These Defender Shieldâ„ services are designed to prevent minor issues from growing in scope by taking corrective actions that limit the size or severity of their impact. With our program you will experience:
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Improved building envelope performance
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Reduced repairs and failures
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Extended building envelope asset life
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Lowered risks of hazards that can cause personal injury and property damage
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Peace of mind; knowing that your Building Envelope Systems are better managed and cared for
Pantheon Programâ„
Total Building Envelope Management
For customers with large campuses or many buildings, we offer the Pantheon Programâ„ . It is a Multi-year, building envelope maintenance management program intended for larger portfolios of facilities with a mix of building types and building envelope systems.
It Includes:
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Reactive repairs and on-demand emergency service
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Proactive cleaning, inspection & maintenance (Defender Shield™)
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Data Collection & Insights (SURESightâ„ database)
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Planned repairs (Hazard Defenderâ„ )
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Strategic Restoration work
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Design-Build System Installation (Eagle’s Beak)
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Program Management services
