The Iowa Events Center (IEC) in Des Moines is a four-property arena and exhibit hall collection located on the banks of the Des Moines River.
Two of the key structures – a new sports arena and an exhibition hall – were to be built from the ground up, while a third building would undergo some modifications to an existing commercial kitchen.
The Iowa Events Center presented a large project where local contractors Waldinger Corporation would buck industry conventional wisdom by not specifying rectangular ductwork and instead recommending a superior product — round ductwork. The specification had to overcome traditional resistance to using premium spiral ducts and instead demonstrate why using Lindab Safe® would save large amounts of money on installation costs.
“The prevailing consensus around this issue was that people don’t use spiral because [they think] it costs too much,” Nick Slauson of Waldinger Corporation explained. “Such thinking does not consider line items or labor costs. Bids need to look at the cost to completion for the entire system.”
“At the Iowa Events Center, when you factor in the savings in labor and material, we achieved a better duct system with a higher pressure class at the same cost,” Slauson said.