Architects and city planners use screens to conceal mechanical equipment, including HVAC units, solar panels, cooling towers, and transformers. While this equipment is essential for building operations, these screens can help eliminate safety hazards and also offer visually unappealing surfaces. Expanded mesh, perforated metal, and laser-cut panels can conceal the equipment items without disrupting the overall design of the surrounding structure, while also allowing the equipment to function properly and allowing heat and gases to pass through effectively.

Benefits of Using AMICO Materials for Equipment Screens

Material Directionality: Expanded mesh is dimensional and, when appropriately oriented, can provide added opacity disproportionate to its open area, creating a high-performing rooftop screen.

Create a precise open area: AMICO materials are easy to manipulate and modify to reach a precise open percentage to ensure your rooftop equipment needs are well served.

Attractive Surfaces: AMICO materials offer a wide range of finished and design customization options, so you aren’t just creating an obligatory rooftop screen, but you can add design value and beauty to your structure.

Equipment Screen Project Case Study

Xcel Substation Equipment Screen

The Xcel Energy Substations are 1-acre installations located in developing neighborhoods. The primary objective of the screens was to enhance the overall look of the neighborhood, and it was designed with the help of feedback from local community members. Forty thousand passersby enjoy these stations every day. The expanded mesh screen obscures the industrial electrical equipment and, at night, is adorned with lights that change color and fade in and out, giving the design a dynamic feeling.

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Chevron Headquarters Equipment Screen

Mechanical equipment is often an unsightly necessity in a design. The mechanical equipment for this project was highly visible to campus visitors and adjacent residential properties at the Midland Chevron Headquarters building. The designers at Populous turned a “wart” into a gem by cladding it with equipment installation, using rustic panels and expanded mesh that allows the equipment the necessary airflow to take in and push out air.