Articles

Links to important articles

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/housing-lobby-in-5star-mystery/2007/05/24/1179601576302.html

This link provides an inciteful account of the needs and requirements for 5-star housing ratings. The article includes opinions and figures on the effectiveness of the current system, aswell and proposals for a new system, and the economic effects of both.

http://www.generalcontractor.com/construction-projects/tilt-up.asp

This link is a valuable resource which compares and provides good information on both precast and tilt up panel systems.

http://theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21793140-25658,00.html?from=public_rss

This link explains the recent decision to spend $60million to makeover part of St. Kilda's seafront. This is to become the new site for a venue to be opened up by world famous music team "Ministry of Sound." The currently delapidated site will be developed by a team led by St Kilda architect Carlo Catani.

LINKS

Links that will benfefit ya'll

www.onesteel.com.

This site is excellent for anything to do with structural steel, pipes, mesh, aluminium products, etc. I have found it most valuable for sizes and information on Universal Beams and Columns.

www.chhwoodlogic.com.au

This site is good for anything to do with engineered timber products.

www.precastpanels.com.au

APPS (Australian Precast Panel Systems) is an industry leader when it comes to the supply and information on Precast concrete panels. This site is very informative.

www.uniqueconcrete.com.au/concrete_tilt_up_panels.htm

This site has excellent photo galleries that show a well documented construction process for tilt up panel systems, it is a very valuable resource.

www.bluescopesteel.com.au

Contains very good information on cladding and steel decking system, of particular note is the technical catalogue and manual available for use with Bondek suspended formwork systems.

www.formwork.com.au

Excellent Australian resource for formwork information.

Complete model, focus= connection between portal frame wall cladding and frame system.

Steel Fabrication

Steel Manufacturers visit; Geelong Fabrications, 1-19 Madden St. North Shore.

Where it all happens; the sketching and consultation room. This is where sketches and client consultations occur. The structural engineer spends time in here during the initial concept stages of the project. During our visit, work was being carried out on bridge ends for part of the Mitcham/Frankston Freeway project. These bridge ends were 33m High and made entirely out of steel.





The main workshop, where all welding and steel product fabrication occurs. The workshop was set up into four areas, two where singal shape and member fabrication occurred, storage and a huge fabricaton area for the entire project.








This is where basic shapes are welded. These shapes, eg. in this case, he was welding a simple square, are used to fit into the bigger project. These shapes are welded to perfection, in accordance with engineer's specifications. All the details and specifications for these shapes are provided by detailed shop drawings. Upon completion, these shapes are crane lifted over to the major project and then welded into place.





This is where basic steel members are manufactured, as you can see from this picture, in this case C-section steel beams are being produced. Once again members are manufactured according to shop drawing specifications.

This was the major project (bridge end

), being worked on while we were there. This bridge end was one of four and took many worker

s to complete. The bridge end pictured here was still being pieced together. 4-way lasers are used to correctly cut and piece together all elements perfectly.






Here is a CAD produced sketch of the final product. Due to client confidentiality, we were unable to photocopy any shop drawing, however we did view many, the file for this project was enormous.















Bridge end being painted

Portal Frame "close ups"

ROOF BRACING EXAMPLE

STANCHION TO PANEL CONNECTION

APEX JOINT

STORMWATER OFFSET

Tilt Slab site visit, Geelong Road, Geelong West

This site was visited after the floor slab had been laid and the tilt up panels had been mostly casted. The site was a private development by a local firm and it was the construction of a 4 storey office building.

This is a picture of the site in general, note the
concrete slab and the casted panels in the
background. We were lucky enough to be
allowed onto the site, where we could see
the crane in operation.
In the time that we were there, the crane
wasn't doing much as it was the worker's
lunchbreak.






Here is an example of one of the stack casting areas. After speaking to the site foreman, we learnt that during the puring of these slabs, only one set of formwork was used. This is a very efficient way of operating, The tilt panels were cast with lifting point as they are required to be lifted around the site. These panels and the other ones on site at the time were for the bottom level of the project. Further stack casting was to occur with pre-cast panels manufactured offsite to make up the walls and suspended slabs for above levels. The reason for a mixture of the two construction methods was to save money.


This was a good example of site storage. It was also where we were able to see the temporary struts used in the erection of the panels. Some of the struts were telescopic, making them the obvious choice on site, due to their versability.

Pre Cast Panel Transport

Once Casted, the panels are transported to site. Transport is not too complicated. Panels are crane lifted onto trucks. These trucks have specially angled racks, as you can see in images below. It is also obvious that chain tie downs are used to hold the panels to the trucks, these tie downs must be strong, as once travelling, the panel encounters the dynamic lateral load of wind.