In the midwest, cold weather doesn't ease in. You get a stretch of 60-degree afternoons through most of October, and then it quickly freezes before we expect it.
The good news is that getting ahead of it isn't complicated. It's mostly about making a few decisions in October instead of making them in a hurry. Here's how we'd walk through the cold weather with any contractor, plant manager, or PM who calls us this time of year.
Start with the office
Your on-site office is where your crew warms up and where paperwork is stored. If it's an afterthought, everything else on site gets harder.
A few things worth thinking through before the unit shows up:
- Door orientation. Point the entry away from the north and northwest. Winter's coldest, hardest wind comes in behind a front out of that direction, and a door facing into it can be a struggle.
- The entry zone. Leave four or five feet of floor space inside the door for wet boots, coats, and gear. Put a mat down. Avoid putting valuables right beside the door.
- A short walk from parking. Ice forms on the path people use most. The shorter that path is, the fewer slips you deal with.
- Ground-level access. Steps that ice over become a daily hazard. A ground-level office skips the problem entirely.
- Combo units. An office/container combo puts workspace and secure storage under one roof. Your crew isn't crossing the yard in a wind chill, and your temperature-sensitive materials are already inside the heated envelope.
If you're running more than eight or ten people on site, think about a second warming space or a larger unit.
Get the power right
Know your amperage before you plan anything else to avoid overloading the power.
A few considerations:
- Avoid daisy-chained power strips and household extension cords running things like space heaters. Using proper precaution will prevent fires.
- Use outdoor-rated cords. Standard cords get stiff and the jacket cracks in cold.
- GFCI protection on anything outdoors.
Climate control is mostly insulation
Insulated walls and ceiling do a lot when it comes to climate control. Weatherstripping around the door is important. Steel conducts cold efficiently, which is great for a shipping container and not great for a room with people in it.
Then there's condensation. Warm, moist air from breath, wet gear, and coffee hits cold steel and turns into water. It can ruin paperwork, warp materials, and grow mildew in the corners. You beat it with insulation and a little ventilation.
For unheated storage containers, the same physics applies to your materials. Water-based products freeze around 32°F: paint, adhesives, caulk, joint compound, and a lot of concrete admixtures are done after a hard freeze-thaw cycle, even if they look fine in the bucket. Same story with lithium tool batteries, which lose serious runtime in the cold. Anything on that list belongs in conditioned space, which is another argument for a combo unit or a modified container with heat.
Common mistakes we see
- Waiting for the first cold snap. We move fast, usually 48 hours or less, but modifications take shop time and there's no way around that.
- Leaving freeze-sensitive material in an unheated container. Replacing a pallet of adhesive costs more than heating the space it was sitting in.
- Not planning ahead for pickup. When the job wraps, you want that unit gone on. Don’t pay for storage longer than you need it. Give us a call and we'll be there.
Talk to someone local
Every site is different, and the right setup depends on your crew size, your materials, and what your power situation looks like. Call your local AT&S branch in Springfield, Omaha, St. Louis, Kansas City, Des Moines, or Davenport, IA and talk it through with a real person.
We'll help you figure out what you need and get it on your site quickly, with straightforward pricing and no surprises.