The Corpus Christi Independent School District serves nearly 33,000 students at 56 campuses within 68 square miles. The district recently had two new schools under construction. One school has been completed. The other school is currently under construction and will welcome new students in the fall of 2024. Project Managers Joel Ingram and Travis Yeary from Malek Inc. said that Viega fittings were critical to completing these schools on schedule.
The two campuses have close to 170,000 square feet of space. Malek installed chilled and heated water systems in both schools using MegaPress 4" fittings. They used ProPress fittings on the condensate line. The project was originally scoped as a welding job, but Ingram said that using Viega would ensure they could meet the tight schedule for the construction. Ingram estimates they pressed at least 1,800 fittings on each school, with some of them being tees with three connections. He said they used approximately 4,000 fittings between the two projects.
Ingram and Yeary say they use Viega instead of a hot works method for many of their projects, including the schools and oil refineries. “There are some limitations with building codes in coastal environments,” said Ingram. “But when your driving factor on a project is the schedule, Viega helps us complete jobs faster and maintain a tight construction schedule. People at all levels can use press and put together 4" joints.”
When asked what they would tell someone about using press and Viega, Ingram and Yeary said, “Don’t knock it until you try it. We’ve had issues with other press manufacturers; that just hasn’t been the case with Viega. Great warranty.”
