ENGINEERING FOCUS: BUBBLEDECK + MILLS PARK CENTRE WA
PRESENTED BY STRUCTURAL COLLEGE BOARD CHAIR KARLIE COLLIS, A NEW GREEN STAR RATED COMMUNITY FACILITY IN THE SOUTHERN SUBURBS OF PERTH HAS UTILISED AN INNOVATIVE PRODUCT WITH CLEAR STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING BENEFITS.
The Mills Park Centre is a state-of-the-art sporting and recreational facility that has recently undergone a $47 million transformation from its previous incarnation as a sports oval.
Commissioned by the City of Gosnells with a specific focus on sustainability, the scheme was awarded six stars in design and construction by the Green Building Council of Australia’s Green Star rating system for public buildings.
Perth-based BubbleDeck – a precast concrete system that makes floor slabs lighter and stronger by incorporating large, hollow plastic balls in a lattice of steel – contributed to minimising time spent on site during the scheme’s construction.
Mills Park Centre: BubbleDeck secured numerous gains for the project, from uniform slab thickness to high quality soffits.
The lightweight qualities of the BubbleDeck system have clear ‘green’ advantages, entailing less requirement for structural support and building materials overall, which contributed to the scheme’s green star status. According to BubbleDeck’s Australian and New Zealand structural engineer and Director Karim Yngstrom, BubbleDeck also created structural engineering advantages.
“Mills Park consisted of a single large floor plate with very different patch loadings,” says Yngstrom. “Using BubbleDeck, we achieved a uniform slab thickness that dealt with the various loads and span configurations, making the follow on trades very simple to coordinate. The slab was also split in three different portions with structural movement joints, again going through a uniform thickness without any beams or corbels.”
“The large spanning qualities of the product provided an attractive solution to the engineering team. The good quality soffits that are achieved when pre-casting created an additional advantage, with only painting required on site, in many areas.”
“Working with precast slabs forces the design team to think about all the small issues ahead of site, which results in a simpler construction generally, where the major clashes are dealt with off-site. This also allows the slabs to be cast ahead of time, which helps the program on site.”
“Using BubbleDeck, we achieved a uniform slab thickness that dealt with the various loads and span configurations, making the follow on trades very simple to coordinate. The slab was also split in three different portions with structural movement joints, again going through a uniform thickness without any beams or corbels.”
Karim Yngstrom, Director – BubbleDeck Australia and New Zealand.
“The team at BubbleDeck has worked on over a million square metres of slabs in Australia and as we are focussed on this element only in the building, we can bring a lot of valuable experience to the design team, where we can help achieve better solutions and details. We become a consultant to the consultant as it were. We also provide all the engineering input relating to the slabs, which helps the engineer focus on other issues.” ■
Karlie Collis – College of Structural Engineers (Chair), Engineers Australia.
Karim Yngstrom, Director – BubbleDeck Australia and New Zealand.
