One West Point – Design of Support System for Cladding

Beta Scope

Steel Structures to design and detail the supports for One West Point cladding system.

Background

Beta Design Consultants were commissioned by the Client Lomas Steel Structures to design and detail the supports for One West Point cladding system. The West London development, by is London’s highest residential tower. The support system of structural steel would support Curtain Wall units (supplied by Lingyun) for the Commercial Unit and the Residential Tower in Block D.

Beta Solution

The support system was required to transfer the loads from the curtain walls to the concrete frame. Its design required the creation of a full 3D model to capture the exact geometry of the supporting RC frame. Beta proposed hollow sections that can span between the RC columns, for their efficient shape and ability to resist combined bending and torsion. The steel brackets were then designed to the individual loads supplied by the system manufacturer to transfer the wind and gravity loads to the SHS from the façade units. Finally, the connections between the SHS members and the RC columns, walls and slabs were designed as post-installed fixings.

Practical Details

Beta Design Consultants worked with Lingyun (the façade system supplier) and Lomas Steel Structures (the Fabricator) to design the brackets (between units and SHS) and to design the connections (between the SHS and the RC members)

Beta Design Consultants used Idea Statica to design all steel to steel connections and used Hilti Profis to design all steel to concrete connections. It was important to consider ease of installation, construction tolerances, potential for clash with existing rebar and need to limit deflections which were all factors taken into account during design and detailing.

Beta Design Consultants used Tekla Structures to prepare all the fabrication drawings.