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Below are progress photos received this week from the new Zafara warehouse project at Grantham.

PSL are employed by MCS working under a D&B contract and have been responsible for Structural/Civils design of the warehouse/mezzanine and external yard/parking.

Of particular benefit to MCS have been our carrying out a 3-D topographical cut/feel exercise and which has enabled us to establish building and external yard levels to provide optimum net balance of existing material at site by the re-use of recovered sand/gravels as sub-base.

A further design challenge overcome by our team was to establish a gravity surface/foul drainage systems which discharges at shallow falls along the length of the access road.

Site works commenced in February 2021 and are programmed for completion in August.

Pure Structures have been engaged by TMD building surveyors to work on a second offices refurbishment at the Castle Park Business Park In Cambridge (Our previous involvement being at Abacus House in 2017).

The project comprises the major refurbishment of a 1980s office building to current building standards including replacement windows and M&E.

Also included are the demolition and enlargement of the existing corner atrium and a three story extension in the location of proposed reception to the rear.

The PSL team have arranged investigations of the existing concrete frame and have carried out design and detailing in 3-D using Autodesk Revit.

STOP PRESS!

Latest News from Pure Structures

https://mailchi.mp/77147e15fb31/pure-structures-autumn-2018-newsletter

 

Last night (19th April) Pure Structures entered a team of 6 into the Thomas Sinden quiz night raising money for Coram – one of the UKs first children’s charities helping to transform the lives of some of the countries most disadvantaged children.

With 10 teams in total, we certainly did not disgrace ourselves and came comfortably within the pack.

Our team did however excel with the challenge to build the tallest structure in 10 minutes out of spaghetti and jelly babies.

We were by consensus acknowledged as the outstanding winner adopting the ‘DNA’ repeating triangular form.

A couple of photographs of work in progress are attached prior to a heinous act of sabotage by the TS host team!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Thomas Sinden for a great evening.

 

 

     

     

The construction of a new marketplace in Basildon. Prefabricated cabins are to be placed on foundations designed by Pure Structures and a new service building is being built. The market is due to open Autumn 2017.

This project has been a demonstration of Murphy’s law, requiring multiple re-designs due to unforeseen obstacles on the market square. Careful design of the foundations in the square and for the service building was required, due to the poor quality of the ground on site.

The drainage scheme for the market square was complex, as each cabin required individual water supply and removal, along with electricity supply and internet connection. Fitting all of these in the limited space available was a challenge and also required many revisions.

Services

Full Structural Design

Client

Thomas Sinden

Architect

Martin Arnold

 

The development at Winchester House, Bracknell, is 19 storeys high with a single level basement and replaces the former 3M 15 storey office building, which was demolished during summer 2015. The scheme consists of 311 high-quality flats, a gym and two business units suitable for a restaurant or retail use. The profile of the building steps back at each level above 10^th floor and incorporates roof terraces for residents.

The new landmark building will form a central part of the town centre regeneration along with a new public realm market square.

Pure Structures Ltd were appointed by Comer Homes to carry out the Structural Design of the building.

The building structure is a reinforced concrete frame comprising flat slabs and blade columns and with stability provided by the combined action of shear walls and coupled main stair/lift cores.

The building envelope is a specialist system with feature rainscreen cladding/ribs and integrated balconies.

The main structural elements are described below:

Superstructure

Superstructure floor slabs (2^nd floor level to the roof level) are typically 250mm thick reinforced concrete flat slabs. Floor slabs are locally increased to 450/500mm thick transfer slabs at 10^th floor level and above where column reframing is necessary due to stepping back of the floor plan to accommodate the external terrace areas.

The 1^st Floor slab is typically 400mm thick and enables in-slab transfer of column loads from rectangular sections (above) to 750mm Ø columns within retail areas (below). Where rectangular/circular columns (above/below) are not concentric, transfer beams/slabs are provided similar to the upper floor levels at 1000/1200mm thick.

The retail arcade (tunnel) through the building at ground floor level created a 275m² column-free zone. To achieve this, the structural floor plate was locally increased to 1200/1400mm thick where a transfer structure is provided to support columns above which are coordinating with the typical residential arrangements up to 12^th floor.

Floor slab design was carried out using RAM Concept FEA (Finite Element Analysis). Overall stability of the building has been analysed using an FEA full structure model in Staad Pro. The model was dynamically analysed to the Euro Code 1 wind spectrum of gusting frequencies to establish the dynamic response frequency of the structure.

Basement

The basement is contained within a contiguous piled wall enclosure, with facing insitu concrete liner wall.

The contiguous wall comprises 750mm Ø piles and is typically provided with a 1050mm deep capping beam at Ground Level. The capping beam increases to 1500mm deep on the end elevations of the building, where columns are supported directly on the capping beam at Ground Level.

To facilitate basement excavation/raft formation, the contig wall was designed as a cantilever wall and enabling unrestricted access for the construction of the core rafts and internal pile caps.

Foundations

The building is supported on an arrangement of both CFA (Continuous Flight Angered) and Open Bored Rotary piles supporting a RC raft foundation.

Open Bored Rotary piles were installed from Ground Level within the extents of the Basement area. This reduced the amount of concrete required by pouring the pile to Basement Level and leaving a 4.0m void within the steel pile casing up to pile mat level at Ground floor. This method of piling also enabled the installation 31.0m deep piles.

During the site enabling works and demolition of the existing sub-structure to the former 3M building, 900/1500mm Ø diameter piled foundations were uncovered.

These existing piles were surveyed and their positions overlaid onto the proposed Basement plan/new piled foundation arrangement.

The new foundation piles and raft have been designed to ‘bridge over’ the existing piles where they coincide with proposed new columns and cores and making the existing piles redundant.

BIM (Building Information Modelling)

All drawing production was carried out using Autodesk Revit and Pure Structures’ BIM model provided a valuable tool for the client and contractor to improve the construction process. Collaborative work carried out between the design team was also particularly useful in relation to setting out coordination and clash detection.

Project Progress

Work commenced on site in February 2017 and with completion proposed for the end of 2018.

 

Services

Full Structural design

Client

Comer Homes Group

Architect

Frank Shaw Associates

   

 

 

 

 

We are pleased to welcome the following new members of staff.

James Tuite

James joined the Trainee Engineer Programme during 2016 and has spent 6 weeks with us during this summer.

He has now departed for his first year at Brighton University.

He will combine his studies with years 3, 6 and 7 spent at our offices.

We wish him all the very best with his first year at university.

 

 

 

 

 

James Whitby

James joined the Trainee Engineer Programme during 2016.

James first year will be spent at our offices learning Revit and Autocad skills prior to departing in September 2017 to start a 4 year masters in Civil Engineering at the Nottingham Trent University.

He will combine his studies with years 1, 4 and 7 spent at the offices.

Welcome James.

 

 

 

Brian Newell

Brian joined Pure Structures in May 2016 as part of the Engineer Training Scheme where he will combine practical experience at our offices with day release studies for a BSc in Civil Engineering at Anglia Ruskin University.

Brian is a mature student having previously completed a BSc in Social Studies in 2007.

He made a career change to the construction industry in 2008, first becoming a carpenter and thereafter during 2011 becoming a site manager for Central Piling.

 

 

 

 

 

RECENT CHANGES TO PURE STRUCTURES LTD

Linda Duck

During March 2016, we said a fond farewell to our Office Manager Linda Duck who has this year retired.

Linda carried out a diverse role during the first 8 years of our business, covering aspects of office management, book keeping and as a Senior PA/Secretary.

We wish her and her Husband Rod a well-earned, happy and long retirement.

 

 

Elaine Fisher

A Chartered Management Accountant by training, Elaine has been Company Secretary since incorporation in 2008.

Returning to work after young children she takes on the role of office manager and accounts (from Linda Duck).

From a big company background with Oracle, Black and Decker and Coopers and Lybrand, Elaine brings with her much needed financial management experience required as our company develops into a mid-sized practice.

We all welcome Elaine in her new role.