What Is Mechanical Contracting?
The term mechanical contracting covers the mechanical skills, crafts and management techniques that are among the fundamental requirements for every type of large building, whether it be a school or a factory, a hospital or a gigantic power plant. The mechanical contracting industry is responsible for installing the heating and air conditioning, piping and plumbing systems without which these buildings and other facilities would be merely empty shells. They would be without interior climate control, ventilation, pollution and emissions control, water supply and waste removal systems that are essential for modern human usefulness. However advanced, or beautifully designed a building may be, without the heart, veins and arteries supplied by the men and women of the mechanical contracting industry, it would be as lifeless as a marble statue.
The mechanical contracting industry functions through a group of individual, independent contracting firms. These firms competitively make offers to builders or governmental authorities to install the mechanical systems in a given building at a specified price and within a specified time frame. Usually, the lowest bidder gets the job. In order to compete and be able to complete the job for the agreed upon price, each firm that enters a bid must have a rather sizable team of highly skilled and productive individuals. Does it really provide any benefit to other people?
Apart from the obvious benefits, of providing dependable heating systems necessary to sustain life in cold weather, consider the relative importance to the good life of something as easily taken for granted as efficient waste removal. Even the most ardent back to nature advocates rarely suggest a return to the outhouse.
Good plumbing bears as directly on the public health as is possible. The horrible plagues that swept across Europe in the past, bringing death to millions, could have been greatly reduced or contained with good plumbing and water treatment. Or think about the healthy indoor climates found in offices, hospitals, hotels, apartment houses, factories and schools. Most people in New Jersey live in metropolitan areas where air pollution is a serious problem. The only real escape is inside the buildings where we work, play, sleep and live most of our lives, surrounded by four walls and a roof. Without the skills and dedication of the people in the mechanical contracting industry, these buildings would be uninhabitable.
As it is, the industry provides mechanical systems that not only automatically maintain comfortable temperatures by alternately heating and cooling these living spaces, but filter and clean air for breathing, and humidify or dehumidify it according to need. In short, it may be said without exaggeration that the main reason for this industry’s existence is to serve people by creating an ever better environment for them to live in.
