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| Sector |
Industrial |
| Project type |
Refurbishment |
| Services provided |
Product / system manufacture Product / system supply |
| Project location |
West Midlands |
| Contractor |
AA Installations |
| Products used |
Legato™ interlocking concrete blocks |
Elite was contacted by a West Midlands client regarding an old, derelict warehouse that had become dangerous. It had a high, bowing gable-end and the same on the connecting wall, both walls being of brickwork, caused by a build-up of material outside pressing against the rear and side of the building.
The building was to be demolished but there was a requirement for something to strengthen the inner part of the building whilst keeping a proportion of the existing brickwork to a set height – then the roof and metalwork could be safely taken down.
AA Installations built a row of Legato™ interlocking concrete blocks, three rows high at a set distance from the brickwork on the inside of the gable-end of the building. These would join at right angles to an interlocking row of blocks at the same height running down the inside of the external brick wall. This would then lower to a row of two blocks as the external ground tapers down leaving a void between the existing brick wall and the blocks. 177 Legato™ blocks were used in total.
The far ends of the Legato™ blocks were set at an angle inwards to the wall. Free-draining fill material was placed in the void between the rows of blocks and the existing retaining walls, and drainage measures were constructed to prevent groundwater from building up behind it. The wall was therefore designed with no retained water pressures.
Once the Legato™ blocks had been erected, all the gable-end brickwork above the blocks was demolished. Subsequently the rest of the building was taken down leaving an L-shaped row of blocks where the two sides of the warehouse had been, looking aesthetically pleasing to the eye and carrying out the retaining job that they were designed for.
