In the February 2016 issue of Metal Architecture, East Coast Metal Systems (ECMS) was featured in an article that focused on MCM panel in project specifications and the various aspects of panel features that can affect the cost/benefit analysis for a project.

“The metal panel is the wrapping paper for the building,” says John Trifonoff, vice president, metal operations for East Coast Metal Systems, Bellaire, Ohio.

“You’re really not limited on panel size – only the size that the manufacturers can produce – but for workability in the field, the largest we like to promote is 5 by 16.’ When it gets bigger than that, you get into excess costs. The substrate needs to be designed in a certain way, and it becomes a very cumbersome panel size in anything larger.”

“Color is also limitless, but the only thing about color is a lot of times they spec a custom color in small quantities. We’ll have a job that only has 2,000 or 3,000 square feet on it, and it calls for two or three custom colors. The cost is astronomical, and it usually gets value-engineered out due to the misunderstanding of this cost impact to produce such small quantities of custom colors.”

“The panel shape is only limited to your imagination except for a few little things – one is acute angles. If it is spec’d at over 135 degrees – on a bull nose for example – we’ve had to work with the architect to alter the design. You can’t bend the material like that. Or, when they try to incorporate small bump outs or features in a panel that are smaller than an inch, these can be cumbersome. Usually you have to change the design to allow for fastening points and the thickness of the material. A lot of times architects look at it like it’s a piece of sheet metal, but it’s not. It’s thicker. It doesn’t work like sheet metal.”

Source: Metal Architecture