R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. A drone captured this image of the workers making repairs.
The Lucky Strike Smokestack is looking particularly spiffy these days thanks to a summer of hard work from R&P Industrial Chimney.
ATC Operations Manager Rich MacLeod told Capcom about the multi-year process of getting the smokestack in tip-top shape.
“R&P Chimney came out October 2018 to replace a steel reinforcement band that broke,” he said. “While they were onsite, I had them conduct an exterior condition assessment inspection. The examination concluded a considerable degradation of the mortar surfaces. Although, the deficiency did not pose a danger to life or structural collapse, they recommended to a 100% tuckpointing of the entire 201’ stack to prolong the integrity of the façade.”
MacLeod explained, “Tuckpointing is a process of cutting/grinding the old mortar joints up to 1’ or until solid mortar is reached. After cleaning the joints, new mortar is evenly filled with a high-strength Portland cement mortar mix containing non-shrinking properties.”
MacLeod originally scheduled the work for the first quarter of 2020, but due to the uncertainty as the pandemic began had to cancel.
“The project found its way back onto the capital expenditure schedule for this year,” he said. “The project lasted 6 weeks during some of the hottest days of the year. It was certainly one of the most visible and popular projects I have been involved in at ATC.”
The R&P Industrial Chimney team started the work in June, and completed the refurbishing in July.
“I am glad there are companies like R&P Industrial Chimney who are willing to come out and spruce things up a bit,” said ATC General Manager John Morris. “I have been working with this group for 11 years and have always been pleased with their work. I realize that I work in a rather unique place and you may never find yourself in need of this type of work, but if you do R&P comes highly recommended.”
WRAL-TV News Photographer Vinnie Boccanfuso captured footage of some of the work in progress via drone.
Thanks to ATC’s Rich MacLeod for these Capcom photos and to WRAL-TV’s Vinnie Boccanfuso for this Capcom video.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. A drone captured this image of the workers making repairs.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. They took a series of exterior condition assessment photos when planning the work.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. They took a series of exterior condition assessment photos when planning the work.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. They took a series of exterior condition assessment photos when planning the work.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. They took a series of exterior condition assessment photos when planning the work.
R&P Industrial Chimney refurbished the mortar in the Lucky Strike Smokestack at American Tobacco during the summer of 2021. They took a series of exterior condition assessment photos when planning the work.
