Built in a former bank vault
Tyler Vault Datacenter began with a retired high-security safety deposit bank vault that became a hardened local datacenter through a practical buildout focused on security, power, cooling, fiber, and serviceability.
Construction story
This page keeps the current Tyler Vault descriptions and displays the original project photos in the same clean side-by-side format as the 3rd Floor page.
We began with a retired high-security Class III safety deposit vault. The first floor of the bank building was poured directly on top of the basement vault, resulting in a vault roof that includes more than 36 inches of plate steel and concrete. Before construction began, the facility had to be stripped down to the bare walls, and all flammable materials had to be removed.
Because we used Unistrut on the ceiling, we had to install a large number of lag bolts from below. Necessity being the mother of invention, we built a rig and attached the hammer drill to it so this part of the installation would run more smoothly and efficiently. We shattered several carbide-diamond bits while drilling through the material used to construct the bank vault walls.
When the vault was built, there was no need to leave holes for power, data, or coolant lines. Therefore, we had to use diamond coring bits to penetrate the walls. These walls are 18 inches thick with four layers of one-inch steel rods in a four-inch mesh pattern. It took three days to drill all the cores, but clearly these thick walls were built for that time buffer.
After years of experience fixing servers, we knew the necessity of covering the floor with anti-static paint.
Since we used Unistrut, it only took two people one day to hang the ladder racks. Here you can see the lights are now mounted directly to the ceiling. This provides better air flow and keeps them away from any data cables.
Locally trained master electricians perfectly configured the data center power supply to include failover between two independent lines entering the building.
We installed fiber trays to support fiber entering from outside the facility as well as rack-to-rack connections. The building is a hub for fiber connectivity in the Tyler area, with multi-path fiber connections from multiple carriers operating from our datacenter.
With a two-ton limit on the service elevator, we had to remove all UPS batteries and haul them in separate trips. Because both UPS systems required clearance through sharp corners and doorways, they were moved by the experienced safe moving crew at Locksmith Services of Tyler. Through our dual Powerware systems, each unit in our racks has two plugs for battery redundancy that each sit behind two isolated power sources.
Air conditioning was a unique challenge, but Modern Indoor Comfort Zone was up for it. With a mixture of green technology, high-efficiency DX, and chilled water units, we have reliable, redundant, and cost-effective cooling. Using hot and cold aisles, we pull in cold air from outside and then send hot air from servers to heat the building during winter. We get free cooling, and other tenants get free heat.
The original project began on October 29, 2009, and was completed on December 9, 2009. Since then, Tyler Vault has provided the Tyler area with a local datacenter, connectivity, and support services. After this router was removed from active service (see the picture on the right), we kept it powered on as a historical marker and as a demonstration that Tyler Vault has maintained continuous power since the day we opened.
