Space4, the new timber housing division of Westbury Homes, manufactures and supplies modular and complete vertical and horizontal housing sections ready for site-assembly, producing components for high quality, environmentally compliant construction.
The procedure that it has developed ensures that an entire weatherproof shell is erected on the pre-constructed foundation pad within an extremely efficient time frame.
This concept is probably out-performing all modern construction methods – but the manufacturing logistics behind the scenes needed to be state-of-the-art. It is the first investment of its type in the UK and the entire installation is a tribute to the vision and determination of the management and workforce at Space4.
An important part of the Space4 investment has been a successful and highly technical partnership between the specialist Homag group company Weinmann and contractor Homag UK. Homag’s Dave Carder worked intensively on the original specification with Space4, along with a series of on-site project managers and technicians who have seen the project through from inception 18 months ago to installation.
The Weinmann installation at Space4 comprises the optimum combination of computer-controlled integrated lines for both floor and wall elements. With components of this size, the handling and conveying systems are exceptionally heavy-duty, so Weinmann introduced its system of multi-function bridges to traverse the length of the workstations and equipped with whatever aggregate units are required.
Good results
Homag UK’s project manager at Space4 is John Britton. ‘For a project of this size we have achieved good results,’ he explains. ‘We are working with some very large dimensions and this makes accuracy a crucial element of the success of the final product.’ As Space4 states in its literature: ‘The precision of the Space4 manufacturing process means that the walls are vertical, the floors are level and the corners are square, so everything fits precisely where it should’.
The company takes up the story: ‘Space4 is a pioneering concept that delivers engineered precision and the efficiency of automation to the construction industry. The materials and methods of manufacture and transportation reduce considerably the environmental impact of construction’.
This is achieved via a methodology that can rely only on a factory production system of the type installed by Weinmann at Space4. The step-by-step process has to be considered as a whole, starting on-site with the laying of the foundations and with the assembly team in place. Lorries then arrive from the Space4 factory carrying the walls and floors, following which the ground floor external walls are assembled. These are pre-assembled at the factory and already incorporate all windows and doors.
The ground floor internal walls are then lifted into place according to each house’s individual design and then the floor cassettes are slotted into place to provide modular framework for service access and connectivity.
First floor assembled walls are then erected, also incorporating in-built conduits for heating, plumbing and electrics. The extremely close tolerances and accuracy of the Weinmann manufactured panels enables the first floor internal layout to be completed swiftly with, finally, the pre-assembled roof being lifted into place.
The Space4 installation at Castle Bromwich is, by the very nature of its highly innovative operation, fairly sensitive about the exact procedures it uses in its approach to this method of construction. Without betraying any sensitive commercial aspects, however, it is possible to outline the general range of equipment and enormous flexibility that both Weinmann and Homag have brought to this sort of enterprise.
To achieve results like these, the Weinmann engineers needed to deploy a combination of highly flexible machine concepts – like the multi-function bridges and butterfly tables that turn large components through 180O – along with customised systems of conveyors, multi-level work tables, vacuum lifts, gantries and specialist handling logistics. The lines are designed to incorporate other machines like routers and saws where necessary and the entire system is computer linked and integrated so that the process – designed to work specifically for each customer’s requirements – is seamless and automatic.
Special projects team
The complexity of designing and installing projects of this nature has seen the emergence of a special projects team at Homag UK where, in the case of Space4, Dave Carder brought his significant level of design know-ledge and expertise to the project. John Britton was employed on-site full-time to oversee the installation and commissioning of the Space4 assignment along with Weinmann engineers and the Homag UK engineering team under the control of aftersales director Paul Newman – possibly the largest team of trained engineers in the country.
Weinmann has been able to develop systems like the one at Space4 by tapping into the formidable technical and R&D facilities of its parent group, Homag AG.
Space4 has proved itself a groundbreaker in this revolutionary form of construction with all its genuine benefits and has managed to achieve continuous flowline processes using equipment which allows it to closely define these. The level of flexibility it has achieved, considering the complexity of the process, is nothing short of astounding.
