Design 2147 CEO Sisto Martello recently spoke with Frank DiBullo, the President and Owner of DiAN Construction Services, about concrete detailing in New York City projects.
Q: Tell us a little bit about what your firm does. It’s a real specialty niche.
A: It’s a very niche business. I started out the business in 2014 as a mom-and-pop business, which we’ve grown nationwide. We work for concrete contractors, general contractors throughout the States, and we specialize in rebar detailing and rebar estimating. A lot of these towers that you see going up, foundations … if you see concrete and there’s rebar in it, that’s me, all day long.
Q: Can you walk us through the process? You receive approved structural drawings, and then you have to transpose them into shop drawings so that people can actually build it in the field. Is that right?
A: Exactly. The way I like to explain it to an outsider is: if you go to IKEA and buy a set of furniture, you have a list of directions on how to put it together. It gives you the sizes, the lengths. That’s basically what we do in a nutshell. The structural drawings that we receive, we take them and transcribe them into drawings that we create for a structural engineer to actually build from. You’d have proper rebar diameters, lengths, bend types, and we do that for every element, whether it be columns, beams, slabs. You name it. It all correlates and ties in together.
Q: Not every job is a 60-story tower. Sometimes it’s a mat slab, a small pad for a generator. Is any job too small or too big for you?
A: No job is too small or too big for us. If there’s concrete outside and there’s rebar in it, it requires a shop drawing, we will do it.
Q: We once worked on a parking garage on Spring Street for the NYC Department of Sanitation that used all stainless steel rebar. What’s the engineering rationale behind that, and how does cost factor in?
A: Rebar is charged per the pound, and stainless is definitely a lot more expensive than standard black rebar. But the reason they use stainless in places like parking garages is the salt: it doesn’t erode as quickly as black rebar, and it holds a higher strength. It’s a straightforward call when you’re dealing with constant exposure to road salt.
Q: What about epoxy-coated rebar. Where does that come into play?
A: Epoxy-coated rebar is used a lot on roadways and at airports. Bridges, too. You see it lying on the side of the road when you’re sitting in traffic. Again, that also doesn’t rust. Regardless of the grade or coating of the bar (stainless, epoxy, galvanized, black), if it’s rebar, it requires a shop drawing, and we produce that.
Q: How did you end up in this business? You didn’t just wake up one day and decide to be a rebar detailer.
A: Full transparency: I didn’t know what rebar was until the early 2000s. I knew what concrete was, but I never put any thought into what goes into it or how it strengthens the concrete. I started my career in 2007 as a check delivery boy for a successful concrete company in Westchester County. I started by delivering materials and checks to job sites, and then one day my boss said, “You know, Frank, I don’t really need you in the field anymore. I need you to learn the engineering side of things.” That’s when I went into the office and honed in on the craft. I spent about seven years there learning the business, and in 2014 I opened up my own shop doing the shop drawings.
Q: It sounds like there’s a checks-and-balances aspect to what you do. Your shop drawings can actually catch errors in the original structural drawings.
A: Yes, absolutely. You nailed it. The key word is “partnered.” We partner with the structural engineers, work with them, not against them. We’re on the same team. There are instances where they see our drawings and decide they want to change something even after the fact, but the relationship is collaborative. They hold all the liability, so we make sure we’re flagging anything that looks off, and they appreciate that.
Q: Can anyone make a perfect shop drawing?
A: Absolutely not. And if anybody tells you they can, they’re selling you a line. There are just way too many moving parts. You’re an interpreter: someone gives you a drawing and says, “Go interpret this and put it together so that somebody in the field is going to build it.” Everything is always needed yesterday, and nothing is ever perfect. The revisions are just part of the process.
Q: You’re approaching 1,000 employees. How do you manage capacity across multiple projects at once?
A: You have a very strong back office. I’ve developed a lot of relationships working overseas throughout the years, and I’m up toward close to 1,000 employees who work on the shop drawings themselves. We organize by project and by client, because every client has different means and methods and ways of doing things. I like them to be familiarized with who they’re working with. The structure is client, project manager, detailer, because I do have project managers here who act as the liaison. They have to always be on point and on top of their game, no matter the situation.
Q: Why did you end up hiring overseas rather than building an all-American team of detailers?
A: Come 2015, I prided myself on having all-American detailers. I had an office of about 15 drafters and detailers. But slowly but surely they trickled away. I came to a crossroads around 2017 or 2018 where it was either shut our doors or pivot. And that’s exactly what we did. There just aren’t young people going into this field in large numbers, so we had to reposition and reshuffle.
Q: How do you think AI is going to change your business?
A: If I were to say I don’t think it’s going to change the business, I’d be lying. The scenario you’re looking at is: you take a set of structural drawings, put it into a scanner, and boom: here’s your estimate, here’s your shop drawing. I think it’s coming, and I plan on staying ahead of the curve. With technology, it’s just so powerful, it’d be silly not to embrace it. If you throw calculations into AI today, it spits them out very fast. I think it’s inevitable. I don’t necessarily see it taking the place of a lather tying bar and placing it in the proper location, but then again, there are robots going around buildings putting up sheetrock, and they’re printing buildings with 3D concrete printers, so who knows.
Q: Where do you see the future of concrete in structural construction: more or less of it?
A: If you look outside, everything is concrete. The second most-used product in the world is concrete; the first is water. Where do I see it going? I think it’s just massive and it’s going to continue to grow. Sky’s the limit for it. With today’s technology, they’re finding new places to use it that weren’t even possible before. You can’t go anywhere in Manhattan without concrete trucks zipping around. New plants are opening, new people are coming into the business. There’s a lot of opportunity.
