Combining existing and new building

An international transport company for packaging in the food industry had a warehouse built in 2011. It is used extensively and forms an important part of the customer’s on-site intralogistics processes. A new, on-site warehouse was required as an extension and needed to be connected to the current warehouse at two points.

The particular challenge of this request was to connect the existing warehouse with the new install, as the existing building was built based on the no longer-current DIN static standards. These national standards have since been replaced by a harmonised European standard, the so-called Structural Eurocode (locally referred to in GB as BS EN 1991). All temporary buildings and warehouses that are installed for more than just a few weeks need to comply with BS EN 1991. In particular, BS EN 1991 determines how wind actions and snow loads for a given building at a given location are defined. 

Herchenbach’s temporary buildings are frequently used by industrial companies, trading firms and manufacturing – most often for many years at one given location. The structural design of all Herchenbach buildings is therefore in compliance with BS EN 1991.

Given that the existing building was constructed on the basis of a now non-current static standard, the seamless connection between the existing building and the new warehouse was a challenge. In particular, the required frame distance was now four metres compared to 5 metres at the existing building. Herchenbach’s engineering team however developed an efficient solution to cleanly connect the two warehouse buildings. Without delays, all was set for the installation of a 20 m wide x 55 m length x 6,40m eaves height new temporary warehouse. Some of the new structure features included a canopy area to be used as a lorry loading zone, custom-made rolling doors and push-bar emergency exit doors, and rain guttering around the accessories.  

Besides the solution to connect the two buildings, Herchenbach also advised the customer on the building’s optimal specifications. Additional insulation and heating was not installed at the new warehouse as this was not required for the type of stored goods. The customer therefore decided to opt for trapezoidal sheet-metal steel walls instead of insulated wall panels, reducing the project costs significantly.

Tel: 01925 552021