Comments on: Construction methodologies

By: Alex

Alex — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 22:33:18 +0000

@ Arther – I’m pretty sure I remember seeing a courtyard in some plans. It would act as a lightwell.

By: arthur

arthur — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:57:46 +0000

I am very curious about the Arch Plus scheme you show on Cable / Tory. Yes, it has a great little zigzag frontage as you say, bt what’s happening further in? Is there a giant atrium inside the scheme, to get light in the other side, or are these angled windows the only means of daylight into the scheme?

And what are they doing on the west side where it adjoins another site. I recall there was a model on display at the showroom on the corner of Tory St, but can’t recall the details. The Piermont website is just useless in terms of showing any helpful information – and the Monument is even worse. Just bullshit pictures of shiny smiley people and nothing to do with the building at all. Don’t know why they bother. Can anyone provide any useful insight on this?

By: 60 MPa

60 MPa — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 17:59:46 +0000

Another reason for timber and/or steel internal framing is weight – solid block or in situ concrete shear walls add up to a fair bit of tonnage and I know of one building in town with sinking piles.A structural steel fabricator I know no longer takes his levels off the tower crane on site after he saw one settle 25 mm over several months on the job.
IT (intertenancy) walls usually have a free air gap but I agree with Rondo – solid is best. I gather Australia does more in situ concrete whereas we do more precast – especially in Chch where river dredging means that the aggregate for concrete gets washed and graded by the river then the council pay people to dredge it out, making the cost much lower.

As for Gib rondo rails – they’re ok but Hardies has a tendency to provide solutions as a marketing tool that don’t neccessarily work that well in practice.They cover their arses by saying that their products have to be installed perfectly. They can be reached for by the inexperienced designer/architect tempted by their “off the shelf” solutions but the best solution is usually good design.

Any company that reincorporates itself in Holland so that it doesn’t have to leave anything but a shell company in Aust to pay for millions of asbestosis related costs where it poisoned its own workers is not to be trusted and, in my opinion, is partly liable for the whole leaky homes fiasco through some bad product design.

Hardies is to building what dairy farmers are to the environment – a prime moneymaker but also the biggest elephant in the room..

By: rondo

rondo — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:33:04 +0000

and of course – gotta put a plug in for it: rondo resilient gib rails. Way to go….

By: rondo

rondo — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:31:41 +0000

Best thing for sound proofing is density, and lots of it. Therefore concrete floors and concrete walls will soak up the sound best. However noise of heels on bare floor will still come straight through with the direct impact sound. So – carpet and underlay – and Bob’s your uncle. No noise transmission.

Don’t know why these cheapo apartments by ArcHaus are having timber floors – crazy idea. They’ll be known as the worst (ie noisiest) new apartments in town before long.

By: davidp

davidp — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:14:25 +0000

Concrete internal walls were common in the Australian city I used to live in. The apartments were very quiet, even when the neighbours were partying with loud music. But I never saw anything other than plasterboard internal walls when I was looking for an apartment in Wellington. RE Agents assured me that the plasterboard is better at soundproofing, but experience suggests that is just bunk.

So why the difference between the two countries? I’m guessing cost, altho earthquake strength might come in to it.

By: 60 Mpa

60 Mpa — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 10:53:47 +0000

Century City Apartments were built with timber floors too and although the boards cup (rise up on the sides) when exposed to rain for a long period of time their acoustic performance isn’t that bad, or rather, concrete can be a bit more “echoey” than one might think.

Steel frames transmit vibrations appallingly – Onslow Road Khandallah Apartments – but concrete precast components eg the double-tees on Sanctum apartments can create an airpocket that resonates.

The best performing acoustic insulation I’ve seen is a set of units in Brooklyn made in the 60′s with block walls and solid (in situ) poured floors – the people upstairs could be jumping up and down and you’d hardly know.

Speaking of noise – I trust we are all enjoying the thunder and lightning tonight?