Devon Energy Center

[RodH]

They offer tours by appointment on Thursdays and Saturdays. I went on November 30. You have to register on the web site Devon Energy Center. They are running about three to four weeks ahead. The tour takes about an hour and a half. You will want to take your camera. The tours are limited to no more than twenty people. All the info can be found on the web site.

[Pete]

They offer tours by appointment on Thursdays and Saturdays. I went on November 30. You have to register on the web site Devon Energy Center. They are running about three to four weeks ahead. The tour takes about an hour and a half. You will want to take your camera. The tours are limited to no more than twenty people. All the info can be found on the web site.

Thanks so much for the info.!

Had no idea they were doing this.

[UnFrSaKn]

I'm surprised Pete didn't know. I've known since the official opening. It was on a promotional .pdf on NewsOK. I had planned a tour back in November but cancelled.

[metro]

I'm surprised Pete didn't know. I've known since the official opening. It was on a promotional .pdf on NewsOK. I had planned a tour back in November but cancelled.

Juked

[UnFrSaKn]

Juked

Devon Energy Center (Devon Tower) - OKCTalk

Read the fine print.
(middle of page)

[Urbanized]

I took the tour a few weeks ago (Devon invited hospitality industry folks including my employees), and it's definitely worth taking. I had been in the building a number of times previously, but still took away quite a bit from it.

[Bailey80]

I was up in the tower this morning with a city elevator inspector for a story I am writing and the restaurant space on the 50th floor was like a wind tunnel. The pressure from the wind blowing around was enough to slam a heavy steel door shut and it was LOUD up there too. I've been up to Vast before and this wasn't a problem. A guy who works there said it had something to do with the warm air in the tower colliding with the very cool air outside. Do any architects or physicists out there know if this is a common problem?

[OKCisOK4me]

I bet you'll have a better shot of getting an architect to answer your question as opposed to a physicist.

My guess is there are not issues in Chicago or other major cities when it comes to wind and since Chilton has several other completed projects in other major cities, my guess is they've faced the meteorological issues before.

[catch22]

Airflow inside of buildings is always strange. They are pressurized so if a door was open somewhere it could cause a strong wind inside until the pressure stabilized.

[OKCTalker]

On December 24 KGOU Radio broadcast a presentation by Larry Nichols and Klay Kimker in which they discussed the construction of the Devon Tower (it’s available at kgou.org). At 13:20 in the recording they discussed worker safety, and Klay mentioned that their actuaries estimated that there would be 5.4 worker deaths on a project of this size. He and Larry went on to talk about specific worker requirements that contributed to a safer workplace. I mentioned this to a family member over Christmas who is a construction supervisor (although not affiliated with any of the Devon projects). He was familiar with some of Devon’s requirements, the consequences for violating them, and he knew workers who were fired on the spot, and companies whose contracts were cancelled for repeated violations. He described the system for worker access into certain workspaces at prescribed times, and it sounded about as difficult as scoring a reservation at Vast.

Two sides to the same coin – “the safest job in north America in the last 10 years,” versus inconvenience to workers and contractors.

[Urbanized]

Death or serious injury sound decidedly inconvenient to me.

[Rover]

I was up in the tower this morning with a city elevator inspector for a story I am writing and the restaurant space on the 50th floor was like a wind tunnel. The pressure from the wind blowing around was enough to slam a heavy steel door shut and it was LOUD up there too. I've been up to Vast before and this wasn't a problem. A guy who works there said it had something to do with the warm air in the tower colliding with the very cool air outside. Do any architects or physicists out there know if this is a common problem?

The thermal barriers between floors and the ventilation systems would be enough to avoid the kind of chimney effect you describe. The skin is an effective thermal barrier as well. If the top and bottom were both open and there was an open path there could be a chimney, but there are too many barriers built in. The closest possibility would be the elevator chases, but even in those remote possibilities the only way it would cause strong air flow through the restaurant would be for the elevator doors to be open, the cars not blocking the opening, and there to be open windows in the restaurant...in other words, a MASSIVE failure.

[Bailey80]

The thermal barriers between floors and the ventilation systems would be enough to avoid the kind of chimney effect you describe. The skin is an effective thermal barrier as well. If the top and bottom were both open and there was an open path there could be a chimney, but there are too many barriers built in. The closest possibility would be the elevator chases, but even in those remote possibilities the only way it would cause strong air flow through the restaurant would be for the elevator doors to be open, the cars not blocking the opening, and there to be open windows in the restaurant...in other words, a MASSIVE failure.

I'm pretty sure there weren't any windows open at Vast, lol. All I know is what I saw and heard. The wind was howling up there. It sounded like a blizzard. Doors were swinging shut, etc. It was a very cold morning, which could have accounted for some of the problem.

I think I found out what the elevator guy was talking about yesterday. It's called the stack effect. Would the problems with the air flow in Vast be considered a flaw in the design of the tower?

Stack effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

From:
Chimney Sweep News: The Stack Effect


"If the stack effect is a big deal in two-story houses, imagine what kind of pressure it causes in high-rise buildings. This pressure is so significant in fact that "when skyscrapers were first developed at the turn of the century, people also had to invent revolving doors because you couldn’t open the front door due to the stack effect pressure," says Straube. "The cold air was rushing in with so much pressure that it was difficult to push the exit doors open."

[OKCisOK4me]

I sincerely doubt that is the cause of what you saw and heard.

[Rover]

Unmitigated there would be a large stack effect. But there are many things done in a building of this type to reduce or eliminate the effect. There has to be a place for air to enter, a passageway to the higher floors, and then a place to exit. In a new building with tightly sealed skin panels, and a sophisticated ventilation system, and without operable windows on top, the air doesn't pass through easily. All this is factored in during design, particularly in consideration of fire and smoke suppression systems. There were world class engineers involved in this design. I would be shocked if this was overlooked or mis-engineered.

[OKCisOK4me]

On the north triangle of the building in the top right hand side there is a vent and if you remember there are a lot of vents on the north side of the building just above the east wing of the rotunda. I'm sure those help in keeping the pressures of the building on an even keel with the outside so the building doesn't implode.

[Urbanized]

Just a thought, but seems possible there was a service door or hatch open to the roof, at the top of an elevator shaft or wherever. Lots of work still ongoing in that building. I haven't heard any other stories like this one, and noticed no weirdness when I visited the top of the tower on a coolish, breezy day. Might just have been an isolated event.

[SoonerBoy18]

just a thought but wouldnt Devon be one worlds top 5 tallest builgings considering its height above sea level

[Rover]

just a thought but wouldnt Devon be one worlds top 5 tallest builgings considering its height above sea level

Not even close. There are whole cities above its tallest point.

[ljbab728]

Not even close. There are whole cities above its tallest point.

Denver being a good case in point. Every building in that city is higher than the Devon Tower.

[Bailey80]

I sincerely doubt that is the cause of what you saw and heard.

OK, I know everybody thinks I'm nuts now, but I don't think I've done a good job of describing what I heard and saw. It was more an air pressure problem on the 50th floor than wind blowing around up there. Doors were slamming shut after they were opened because of the air pressure up there. You could definitely hear the wind howling in the hallway by the elevator shafts. I did some more research on the stack effect in tall buildings and it seems like this really is a common problem. I think the elevator engineer from Schindler that works on the Devon elevators who I was there with actually mentioned that this was from the stack effect but I misunderstood at the time.

A Study on the Development and Application of the EV Shaft Cooling System to Reduce Stack Effect in High-rise Buildings


"ABSTRACT: High-rise residential buildings in Seoul experience stack effect problems during the winter season, such as difficulties in opening residential entrance doors and whistling noises from elevator doors generated by airflow."

From: http://www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/ek...aiap017506.pdf

[OKCisOK4me]

I'll be going to Vast for my birthday in March so I will look and listen for the things you describe ;-)

[SoonerBoy18]

What happend to the 500+ pages?

[Pete]

What happend to the 500+ pages?

I changed the pagination from 20 per page to 40.

[mblues]

OK, I know everybody thinks I'm nuts now, but I don't think I've done a good job of describing what I heard and saw. It was more an air pressure problem on the 50th floor than wind blowing around up there. Doors were slamming shut after they were opened because of the air pressure up there. You could definitely hear the wind howling in the hallway by the elevator shafts. I did some more research on the stack effect in tall buildings and it seems like this really is a common problem. I think the elevator engineer from Schindler that works on the Devon elevators who I was there with actually mentioned that this was from the stack effect but I misunderstood at the time.

A Study on the Development and Application of the EV Shaft Cooling System to Reduce Stack Effect in High-rise Buildings


"ABSTRACT: High-rise residential buildings in Seoul experience stack effect problems during the winter season, such as difficulties in opening residential entrance doors and whistling noises from elevator doors generated by airflow."

From: http://www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/ek...aiap017506.pdf

You are not nuts; throughout the building there are two sets of doors, one on each end of the bank of elevators. The doors have security devices that keep them closed until a security card is scanned. On windy days there is enough air pressure coming through the elevator shafts (actual strong air movement) that some doors will not close until an opposite door is opened releasing internal pressure from the elevator bank area.