We was approached by a Warrington Architect last summer with some very sketchy elevation drawings for a potential 3^rd Storey office construction to be sited on an existing century old 2 storey brick building just outside of Warrington Town Centre.

Having been advised that a number of builders and Structural Engineers had veered away from even tackling such a project we immediately set about taking test samples of ground soils and inspected the existing buildings foundations.

Once we had devised a potential strategy to construct a 3^rd Floor onto such an old building, with our Fabrication Shop Engineers and with our Architect’s we attended a briefing meeting with our clients RAM Properties in advising what we had concluded.

Through our vast experience across the number of major subjects involved in such a delicate operation we reached an agreement that to take the old timber roof of the existing structure with it’s massive rafter members and reducing the great height of the existing 4.50m high first floor level. The weight differentiation between our new 3^rd Floor build to that of the existing demolished first floor and roof elements was absolute minimum.

(Please see RAM Properties Photographs)

With this in mind and using a lightweight structural steel portal frame and a composite cladding envelope. Our demolition team carefully piece by piece dismantled the existing roof breaking down the outer perimeter walls of the existing structure down to the new first floor level. Creating new seating for our new frame by way of installing stub columns founded on spread pad-stones the entire design and build of a new 3^rd Floor office construction was completed in just three months including the new flolors windows and refurbishment of the existing structure.

 All for a pre-agreed Fix Priced Cost!!

The project was to refurbish some 120,000ft2 of existing warehouse space on PCL’s existing land.

Please See PCL Transport (Photographs)

From the initial call we were able to attend site within 2 days with cherry picker and lift access in order to first carry out a complete survey of the existing buildings in order to establish the exact works required and then to accurately measure the warehouse units to immediately order our necessary materials.

A fixed price sum to insulate the roof and walls and over-clad the entire units was agreed including replacing the existing gutters among many sundrie items –

Within 8 weeks (PCL Pictures) these units went from aging warehousing awaiting demolition to brand new commercial production units including Dock levellers, High-speed shutter doors, electrical works and a complete internal fit-out package

Bell Warehouse Prides it’s self on our rapid response to the many differing client demands that have become a feature of our business!!

The client I J Kayes having already achieved a planning permission status for his project, which included a New Weighbridge Building, A New Vehicle De-Pollution Unit and a New 2 Storey Office Building, chose Bell Warehouse for the Design and Build of the scheme.

As our client had little and no Building experience – Bell Warehouse immediately seen that some twenty two difficult planning conditions in the original permission document approval needed to be dis-charged prior to us commencing on site along with a number of conditions that needed fulfilling prior to the completion of the project. Not just this, all works in respect employing and satisfying Building Control all needed to be undertaken with our client wishing for an immediate start on site.

This is where employing Bell Warehouse on a Design and Build basis really works.

With the help of our Architects, our in-house fabrication engineers along with our vast knowledge of Design and Build construction. We immediately contacted Manchester City Council Planners and worked with them in having – Desktop studies, Landscaping scheme devised, acoustic reports, lighting surveys, drainage designs, submitting our full construction drawings to planners. We designed and put in place a bespoke fume extraction system for our clients, produced all samples of building products to Manchester City Council and liaised with building control to inspect the works.

We undertook to carry out a mini borehole site investigation in order to produce soil samples at varying depths which we then transported to our soil investigation engineers in order to satisfy as further condition in a site investigation report.

For all this work over and above our build cost of approx £38 per foot that we had already agreed to carry out on a Design and Build basis. How much did we charge our client?

We did this totally Free of Charge and five weeks after we were appointed to undertake this Design and Build project our steelwork arrived on site and was erected in three days

At Bell Warehouse – Design and Build means everything taken care of as our special commitment to all our clients.

A major sector of Esquire Glass business is the design and manufacture of glass products which are used in all different ranges of the Kitchen market ie Hobs, Doors, Table Tops etc.

In October 2007, Managing Director Mr Paul Lockett approached Bell Warehouse Systems with simplified sketch drawings for a 4,200 square foot extension required to the Padfield site due to needed expansion after seeing the need to create valuable storage space in order to purchase bulk raw materials after a success of contact awards.

Within fourteen days, Bell Warehouse had travelled to Glossop to personally meet with Paul discuss the project and within this timescale had presented him with a fully scheduled out price breakdown itemising – Sub-Structures, Design, Steelwork, Cladding, Doors, Building Control Fee’s and Ground investigastion Report costs all within a simplified letter describing the works with a brief section by section specification.

At this stage, Paul had requested the incorporation of an internal crane to be installed within the new shop area and gave us the go ahead to put in place the ground investigation report in order that we may form a view on the required foundation and re-design our steel frame loading in order to take account of the new crane facility. We turned this new design around within 7 days and prior to a full appointment from Esquire went to meet them with our new costing and specification (the overall adjustment which we showed open-book was a £6K uplift to tkae account of all steel increased sizes and the doulbing in size of foundation bases) which proved a success and our appointment followed by way of a simple confirmation letter based on the fix cost and specification we had produced.

Work commenced in mid January 2008 and the project was handed over to Paul by mid March 2008 for the fixed price of £152,250 this included the full lighting and electrical package including the incorporation of an 8 metre wide electrically operated roller shutter door !!

steel-design-drawings-1 (Please have a look at the attached engineers drawings which we turned around within 7 days)

esquire-01-site-plan-site-plan (See Our Full Drawings for The Scheme)

What we pride ourselves in on this scheme is the maintaining of a high client input where electronic copy drawings were immediatly forwarded to Esquire and direct communication between the client and our own engineers meant all parties had full input and approval prior to construction.

Since the completion of the project, we have provided for Esquire and full maintenance and small works operation facility on the new scheme along with the existing main building.

Directa (UK) are a manufacturer and supplier of construction and industrial components and materials ie Signs, Tapes, Tools, Adhesives etc and space available on their land met with filled to capacity storage moved the way forward of a brand new 3,500 square foot unit.

As the land available was surrounded with a line of some 10 metre high conifer tree’s, a client led ground investigation report recommended the warehouse construction scheme be undertaken on a piled foundation and suspended slab method making coming out of the ground a costly section of the works.

The client Directa (UK) Ltd having already appointed the Architect and with Planning Permission granted the scheme was ready to commence on site. Bell Warehouse Systems attended a meeting with Directa (UK) and their Architects Arcady Ltd where we submitted costings for the new unit along with a proposal to work together with Arcady on an open book design and cost exercise in an attempt to find the most efficient method of sub-structure foundations whilst being faced with the urgent need to progress with the construction.

Having had costs from locally sourced ground works contractor’s in excess of £130,000 for the sub-structures elements alone IE £40 per square foot Bell Warehouse Systems drafted in our own Structural Engineers to come up with a sub-structure design solution which fits the nature of the soils along with being economically viable.

7875-cold-norton-raft-model-1 (See Attached Raft Model Proposal)

Our long standing relationship with our Engineers meant we could sit down with them and look at all other feasible options in order to satisfy our clients requirements and we were able to produce a scheme based on a Raft System and within 10 days on this new design bring submitted to our building control officers, Bell Warehouse commenced on site.

At the time of our pre-start meeting with our clients, we undertook a committment to carry out the entire Ground works package ourselves in order to keep costs to a minimum, a facility we consider is unique throughout the country which we now offer on a National scale. With us purchasing all our own materials and using our own Ground works crew’s not only can we guarantee the not to be beat most economic costs but we aren’t governed by lengthy lead-in times imposed by sub-contract companies.

Within Four weeks of our commencement on site the Raft was completed including a full drainage package for a cost of £53,000 a saving of some 60%.

With the Steel Work and Cladding now complete, we are now undertaking all the Electrical Fit Out works along with carrying out a number of remedial works and refurbishment works to the clients own existing units.

arcady-fire-strategy-dwg-07x09x04revd (Architectrual Drawings)