Maintenance Costs!

[MPdesign]

Gentleman,

I am trying to nail down some costs for yearly maintenance on HVAC items.

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This should be based upon say a 10 million SF estimate across the USA.

I have the following as a start - Please tell me what you think is high and low and why. Excluding water treatment costs.

These include yearly maintenance and the cost of repairs (not replacement) that come up every few years

Cooling tower - $300/yr

Chiller (avg 400 tn) $5,500/yr

AHU (standard office building size) $700/yr

Pumps $200/yr (includes $100/year for repairs alone)

boilers (1,000,000 btu/hr) $1,800/YR (includes $1,20/year for repairs alone)

So, what do you think - and why? I have full faith and trust you as professionals.

[Terence McCann]

Gentleman,

I am trying to nail down some costs for yearly maintenance on HVAC items.

[:-magnify

This should be based upon say a 10 million SF estimate across the USA.

I have the following as a start - Please tell me what you think is high and low and why. Excluding water treatment costs.

These include yearly maintenance and the cost of repairs (not replacement) that come up every few years

Cooling tower - $300/yr

Chiller (avg 400 tn) $5,500/yr

AHU (standard office building size) $700/yr

Pumps $200/yr (includes $100/year for repairs alone)

boilers (1,000,000 btu/hr) $1,800/YR (includes $1,20/year for repairs alone)

So, what do you think - and why? I have full faith and trust you as professionals.

In my other life I use to plan and sell maintenance agreements in the commercial/industrial market. I would have a base labor cost x hours needed to PM equipment /.6 for markup. With a GPM (guaranteed maintenance program - repairs included) I would put a multiplier from 1.8 to 2.2 based on the age of equipment. With this formula you should be good to go for estimating. What you need to know however is how many hours are needed for each piece of equipment.

Take the chiller for example (Ohio Climate):

12yrs A (journeyman) & 16 hours T (trainee) to PM, clean and start a 400 ton centrifugal with associated pumps and cooling tower (includes cleaning the tower and punching tubes). Then 2 hours A time for every other month until shut down in October which would be 4 hrs for an A man. . An A man is probably up to 55.00 per hour cost and a T man might be in the 30.00 cost?? (been a while). You also have to take vehicle charge (20.00 per trip) and maintenance supplies. You have to remember too that you’re not just sending a man to look at the chiller as there is still the AHU, pumps, controls that come into play.

20 hrs A = 1,000.00

16hrs T = 480.00

7 trips VC = 140.00

Water treatment 500.00

Miscellaneous = 150.00

2,270 /.6 = 3,783 selling price. All repairs included might be double that amount. We also use to take insurance policies out on the big tonnage equipment.

You’re light on the price for the cooling tower. I don’t think you could buy a fan motor for a 400 ton tower for 300.00 not to mention the time to install it.

When you state 700.00 for an AHU there is so much information missing that I couldn’t come close to giving an estimate. Chiller water or DX? VAV or constant volume? Pneumatic controls? Are there bag filters and pre-filters? Bag filter can be really costly. A filter change alone might be 700.00.

Pumps may be OK.

Boiler is probably a tad heavy.

[MPdesign]

Terry,

Than you for the response. I am looking for budget numbers only.

For AHU's (say 13' long x 10' high x 10' wide size) - assumes constant volume, heating water coils & chilled water coils. I normally see about 50/50 for pneumatic or ddc - so half the cost of the pneumatic adder. On filters, assume bag-less.