The Fourth Floor and the 117 Unit HVAC Air Handler System: The Backbone of the Internal Air Environment

After the concrete floor was poured on the fourth floor, it was hard to comprehend what the vast expanse, with an additional six-feet of ceiling height, would look like in a few month. At first one could see and walk from one end to the other with no obstructions. As of February 2019, the landscape has completely changed.

A careful look at the fourth floor (area noted above) in the image above, one will note that the floor is taller (by an approximate four feet) than the other floors. The fourth floor houses all of the 117 unit HVAC mechanical air handlers for the whole structural complex..

HVAC Air Handlers

The heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system is essential to for indoor environment comfort. For large structures it takes large HVAC Handlers to evenly distribute the air for comfort and air quality. This is especially true in a hospital environment. The fourth floor of the podium is the dedicated mechanical room for the HVAC Handlers, which will serve both the Children’s and Adult Hospital towers. On January 14, 2019, a new crane was brought in and assembled for the specific purpose of hoisting 117 HVAC Handlers up and over the Children’s Hospital tower and lowering them through a large opening in the podium’s roof where they will be position, by size, weight, and capacity on reinforced pads on the fourth floor. For approximately ten days, the crane will off load 117 of these HVAC Systems and carefully lift them up and over the tower. Depending on the size and capacity of these units, they weigh approximately 7,500 to 12,000 pounds each.

The feature photo depicts a unit being lowered between the two towers, which is a very tedious process as you will see in this post

Facing South: The fourth floor is the mechanical equipment level, which will house all of the HVAC Handlers for both hospital towers including the podium. The concrete floor has been poured and the pads on which the units will sit have been framed and reinforced with rebar. These pads are strategically placed throughout the floor.

Looking to the southwest: Further in on the fourth floor a pad has been poured (center right). Lower left one of the formed pads is covered with a tarp to prevent the fire proofing texture from contaminating the area.

Facing west under the Adult Hospital tower: In this section, the reinforced concrete pads with the forms removed are clearly visible.

Facing east: Another view of the cavernous fourth floor.

Dennis E. Park, MA

After graduate school Dennis accepted a position at Loma Linda University. He worked there for 42 years in the areas of administration and financial management, also teaching accounting and management to dietetic students at the School of Public Health. Through the years Dennis has chronicled the growth of the campus, including the construction of the Drayson Center and the Centennial Complex and the razing of Gentry Gym. He is the author of "The Mound City Chronicles: A Pictorial History of Loma Linda University, A Health Sciences Institution 1905 - 2005." dEp 09.30.2016 🔨

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