METAL ROOF AND WALL CLADDING 
MODERNIZES AN OLDER MANUFACTURING 
FACILITY NEAR CHICAGO'S O'HARE AIRPORT

Successfully manufacturing precision machined parts for the medical, automotive, plumbing, defense and other industries since the late 1940s, it was time to upgrade the family-owned EJ Basler Co. campus’ outdated, low-ceiling masonry buildings just east of Chicago's O'Hare Airport.

Before determining how to proceed, Chicago-based Amstadter Architects was brought in to evaluate the situation. 

"The steel building had rigid bends with bar joists and splayed beams to create the trusses, covered with light-gauge metal siding," reports Marc Amstadter. "The old roof had been torn off and you looked up through the old building into this building. If you can imagine someone plopping a steel building on top of and enveloping an old masonry building, that's what it was."

The manufacturing facility could have been completely torn down, but Amstadter suggested retaining the existing structural skeleton, reinforcing it with new structural steel, re-building the metal building system, supplied by EcoSteel, and adding new cladding with insulated metal panels manufactured by All Weather Insulated Panels.