Heroes Memorial Building and Annex

Ainsworth Associates Mechanical Engineers worked alongside TSK Architects and Clark/Sullivan Construction on the remodel and seismic retrofit of the iconic historic building in Carson City. The Heroes Memorial Building was constructed in 1921 and was designed by local architectural legend Nevada Architect Frederick J. DeLongchamps. The building was designed as a memorial to Nevada soldiers who lost their lives in WWI and was later complimented by the Heroes Memorial Annex Building, built in 1951. Both buildings are receiving seismic upgrades which depending upon the strategy can often mean a complete gut-n-remodel of the building and its systems. Of course, buildings built before the widespread use of modern air conditioning means that pathways and space allocations for air conditioning equipment is often lacking. Due to the tight floor-to-floor clearances and necessity to integrate modern technology into a historic structure, active chilled beams were utilized to provide ventilation and comfort HVAC due to their space saving characteristics. Utilizing the campus’s central plant, the chilled beams offset the building load using mostly water, a denser heat transfer media and more efficient way of transferring energy as compared to air.