Lockheed Martin’s fourth Missile Assembly Building (MAB 4) on its Courtland, Alabama campus expands its presence in the Northern Alabama region.

This pre-engineered metal building (PEMB) comprises a 40,000 SF, 40’ tall high-bay assembly space and an 18,000 SF 14’ tall low-bay space. In addition to the low and high-bays, MAB 4 also includes an 8,000 SF airlock/loading dock area, a 12,000 SF paint booth annex, a 400 SF air compressor PEMB building, a standalone 100-person capacity tornado shelter, a parking lot and miscellaneous civil and site work.

The low-bay houses roughly 20-50 employees and comprises offices, conference space, restrooms, locker space, and additional assembly space for ground support equipment and payload vehicle assembly. The high bay consists of two bridge cranes spanning the south bay with 5-ton and 25-ton capacities, with the opportunity to install future cranes in the north bay. These cranes, in conjunction with the super-flat concrete slab tolerances, allow air pallets to glide across the conductive epoxy flooring installed throughout the high bay assembly area.

Due to the sensitive nature of the assembly material, the entire facility is heavily grounded to prevent any static electricity or energy within the high bay. The epoxy system that covers the floor is conductive epoxy, which has upwards of a 500,000 Ohms resistance, and the entire structure is surrounded by a catenary lightning protection system made up of roughly twenty, 75’ tall poles.

27¸£ÀûÍø constructed the base building of the MAB4 from contract award to substantial completion in an aggressive nine-month schedule. This enabled Lockheed Martin to take ownership of the facility to meet its program’s needs.

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27¸£ÀûÍø delivered the $55 million Santa Cruz Facility (SCF) Transition project on Lockheed Martin’s secure campus in Courtland, Alabama. The job replaces the aging SCF with a modern, high-performance facility designed to support Lockheed Martin’s evolving operational needs in the Northern Alabama region.

The scope of work included the renovation of an existing 23,000 SF structure and the construction of a new 50,000 SF multi-purpose addition, housed within a pre-engineered metal building (PEMB) shell. The structural system incorporated robust concrete elements, including foundations, slab-on-grade, slab-on-metal-deck and cast-in-place blast walls, all designed to meet stringent safety and performance standards required by the facility’s secure nature.

A key component of the project involved installing blast-rated ammunition magazine structures, which required specialized procurement, installation and grounding protocols. The demolition scope was extensive, encompassing the removal of the existing catenary mast system, outdated site utilities and structural components.

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The NASA Mobile Launcher (ML) is designed to support the next generation of manned space exploration and the program’s rocket and associated ground support equipment. It is used in the assembly, testing and servicing areas at existing Kennedy Space Center facilities, transporting space vehicles to launch pads over three miles away and providing ground support for launches. The ML’s basis of design was the Constellation Program’s Ares I rocket, but it can be used to launch both Government and commercial rockets.

The mobile launcher structure has a 133-foot by 158-foot base and a 406-foot-tall tower, weighing an impressive 6.8 million pounds. It was constructed 22 feet in the air on top of mount mechanisms that were built for the Apollo/Saturn programs and were transported by the existing Crawler Transporters built initially for those programs.

The Mobile Launcher contains two main components, the first being the Mobile Launcher Base (MLB), containing the main support structure with a base, tower, launch mounts and facility ground systems that include power, communications, conditioned air, water for cooling, wash-down, elevators and ignition over-pressure protection. The second component, the Mobile Launch Tower (MLT), consists of multiple platforms for personnel access and rocket umbilical systems. In addition, there is a removable launch mount that is the integration point for the rocket to the base—a highly precise piece of hardware that is fitted to the space vehicle being launched.

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The $190 million modification project transforms a historic launch complex into the only dual-use pad in the world that handles both Atlas V and Vulcan Centaur rockets simultaneously. The project consists of a new 183-foot-tall Vulcan Launch Platform (VLP). It is outfitted with the equipment and umbilicals needed to supply the Vulcan Centaur with liquid natural gas (LNG) propellant and liquid oxygen to the first stage, liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen to the Centaur upper stage, conditioned air to customer spacecraft and rocket compartments, electronics, power lines and command-and-control cabling.

Modifications to the active launch pad’s infrastructure include the installation of a 100,000-gallon LNG storage area, a 122,000-gallon Centaur liquid hydrogen (LH2) area and a 65,000-gallon liquid oxygen (BLOX/CLOX) storage area, and an improved Acoustic Suppression Water System (ASWS) with 28-inch pipes and additional larger water tanks.

Work also included modifications to the Vehicle Integration Facility (VIF) platforms to accommodate the 12-foot-diameter Atlas V with up to five Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) and the 18-foot-diameter Vulcan Centaur rockets with up to six SRBs. Modifications to the Spaceflight Processing Operations Center (SPOC) included a new 160-foot tower and access platforms and the scope for Service Vans (M-Van, P-Van & S-Van) consisted of miles of control cabling and reconfiguration of thousands of termination points to allow control and monitoring of the payload.

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The 27¸£ÀûÍø Design-Build team was given an unique opportunity to be a part of the Commercial Crew program. NASA’s Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) brings the United States one step closer to launching crews back into space from American soil. Commercial transportation to and from the International Space Station (ISS) will provide for additional research and discovery on the orbiting laboratory. The station is critical for NASA’s continued research for understanding and overcoming the challenges of long-duration space exploration.

The CCtCap project for United Launch Alliance provided the retrofitting of Launch Complex – 41 to accommodate the new CT-100 Starliner Space Capsule. The project includes a new Crew Access Tower (CAT), a Crew Access Arm (CAA) and modifications to the platforms inside the existing Vertical Integration Facility (VIF) building adjacent to the Launch Complex. The Crew Access Tower supports the Crew Access Arm, which is movable by a hydraulic system, and will allow future astronauts easy access to the CT-100 Starliner Capsule. The platforms inside the VIF building, where the rockets are stacked, was renovated to fit the outer mold of the new capsule.

Due to the complexity and uniqueness of the project, this job was completed in two phases: Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) and Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap). CCiCap was the original contract awarded to the 27¸£ÀûÍø Design-Build team, which consisted of all of the design and preplanning required to complete CCtCap. CCtCap was an option that was awarded post contract. The safety of the American astronauts was first and foremost from day one–ensuring that the CAT and the CAA would provide safe access to the CT-100 Capsule and remain fully functionally after multiple launches was priority one.

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27¸£ÀûÍø has a long history of success with Samsung Austin Semiconductors dating back to 1997 when 27¸£ÀûÍø constructed their U.S. Headquarters and three-story Wafer Fabrication Plant, the first in a series of projects at their now sprawling 300-acre Austin campus. In May 2006, 27¸£ÀûÍø was selected as the prime architectural and structural contractor for the new Fab 2 (A2) Chip Fabrication Facility. The 1,301,400 SF structure covers an area the size of nine football fields. In one year, this mega-project was substantially complete, with a grand opening ceremony held on June 14, 2007. At the ceremony, the University of Texas Longhorn Band, UT Cheerleaders, pop singer LeAnn Rimes and a bald eagle helped dedicate the new chip factory — the biggest in Texas and one of the largest foreign investments in the United States.

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