The purpose of the project was to construct new modular accommodation consisting of offices and welfare facilities for the Brighton Works Delivery Team at the Combined Engineering Depot (CED), and to facilitate their relocation from their existing home at the Ponderosa.

 

The facility was designed as two stacked prefab rectangular modular units, fixed to the concrete foundation underneath. The size of the building was designed to accommodate at least 27-30 people at one time with the provision of all the necessary connections to external services, including drainage, water supply and electricity.

 

During the construction phase the following works took place. The site was set up as a CDM site due to the length of the construction phase and the number of man hours required, excavations were carried out for the building foundation as per the design provided by the Spence internal design team and the services passing through the excavated areas were made secure by wrapping them in Cordek cushions. Excavated areas were poured with specified concrete and a cube test was carried out to confirm the strength of the concrete. Pre-fab modular units were delivered to site and laid on the foundations as per the approved lifting plan, internal and external fixtures were installed as per the manufacturer’s specifications, external services were connected following tests to confirm the reliability of the connections and M&E commissioning was carried out to confirm the compliance of the installed equipment to the specified standard.

The scheduled delivery program was planned for 8 weeks with a critical end date which had to be met due to the client’s requirement. The project was delivered on time and within budget with a 100% safety record.

The biggest issue was ensuring the supply of electricity and water to the new accommodation was sufficient. Additionally, being a brownfield site, the buried services record was not reliable. The proposed foundation design of the building needed the correct soil condition information.

These issues were identified upfront and the investigation process was put in place as soon as the work order was issued by the client. The intention was to start works on site with clear and solid information in order to avoid any disturbance to the site’s operational activities.