Concealed Work and Unprotected Penetrations at a Drywall Inspection
A framer calls for a drywall inspection on the third floor of a five-story, Type III-A, fully sprinklered R-2 building. The plans show 1-hour corridor walls and a 2-hour shaft enclosure. On arrival you find:
- One side of a corridor wall already finished, taped, and painted.
- A 3-inch PVC drain line passing through the corridor wall, with the annular space packed with mineral wool and no sealant.
- A 20-by-20-inch access panel cut into the shaft wall, fitted with a plain steel cover.
- A duct passing through the shaft wall with no damper.
The superintendent says the painter was simply ahead of schedule and offers to "make it good at final."
1. What is your immediate action on this inspection, and can you accept the offer to correct at final?
Read the worked answer
Do not approve the inspection. The correct action is to fail it, document the conditions with photographs and notes (including which side is concealed and when you observed it), and issue a written correction notice listing each deficiency separately.
The offer to correct at final cannot be accepted, for two reasons:
- Concealed work. The inspection regime exists precisely so that assemblies are verified before they are covered. Work must not proceed beyond an inspection point without approval, and where required work has been covered without inspection, the building official may require the covering to be removed so the work can be observed.
- An assembly passing to final does not fix what is behind the board. The corridor wall's rating depends on the board, fasteners, and firestopping as installed. Nobody can approve what cannot be seen.
Make the correction notice specific and re-inspection conditions explicit: penetrations firestopped per listed systems, the access panel replaced with a listed rated panel, a listed damper installed at the duct, and the concealed side of the corridor wall exposed at locations you designate so the layering and fastening can be verified. State that re-inspection will not occur until the contractor notifies you that all items are complete.
2. Evaluate each of the three deficiencies against the code: the PVC penetration, the access panel, and the undampered duct. What exactly is required for each?
Read the worked answer
PVC through a 1-hour corridor wall. A listed through-penetration firestop system is required. Mineral wool packed in the annulus is a component of some systems but is not a system - the assembly must be installed per a published listing tested for plastic pipe through the specific wall construction, and the system designation should appear on the approved plans and on the installer's documentation. Note that plastic pipe is one of the harder cases because the pipe melts and leaves a void; generic sealant products are not a substitute.
Access panel in the 2-hour shaft wall. An opening cut into a rated assembly must be protected by a listed component with the same rating and the same fire-resistance period as the wall. A plain steel cover has no listing for this use and, by cutting the board, the contractor has also altered the shaft wall's rated configuration. The fix is a listed fire-rated access panel installed per its listing, or elimination of the opening.
Undampeded duct through the shaft wall. Ducts and air-transfer openings in rated assemblies require protection; where a damper is required, it must be listed, installed per its listing, and accessible for inspection and maintenance. With no damper, the shaft's 2-hour integrity fails at that opening, and the deficiency also propagates to the duct's own penetration firestopping.
Verify as well that the walls themselves were built to the listed assembly - stud size and spacing, layers, and fasteners - because a correct firestop in a wrong wall is still a failure.
3. The general contractor asks what it will take to close this out, who pays, and whether you can approve the walls you cannot see. Write the follow-up requirements you would put in the record.
Read the worked answer
Put it in a written correction notice, and keep the language factual and itemized:
- Firestopping. Submit the firestop system designations for every penetration through rated assemblies on floors 1-5, with the manufacturer's installation instructions and the installing contractor's identification, plus a penetration schedule maintained on site. Where special inspection of firestopping applies to this project, third-party inspection reports are required before re-inspection.
- Access panel. Replace with a listed rated assembly of equal rating or remove the opening and restore the wall per its listing.
- Damper. Install a listed damper at the duct penetration per its listing, and show access for maintenance.
- Concealed side. Expose the finished side of the corridor wall at two locations of my choosing for verification of board layering, fastener type and spacing, and stud spacing. Additional locations may be required if the first two reveal noncompliance.
- Re-inspection. Contractor notifies when complete; a re-inspection fee applies, and repeat failures escalate.
On cost: the code places the cost of exposing and correcting covered work on the permit holder, not the jurisdiction. On approving unseen work: no. Make clear to the contractor that the certificate of occupancy will not issue while rated assemblies remain unverified - that is the leverage that gets the wall opened.