A Whole New Light; Refurbishment Using Zenon Evolution

High Access Maintenance Limited undertook a 16 week project in Warrington on a distribution centre to refurbish the building and its roof.

High Access offer a comprehensive high-level building maintenance and cleaning service for the commercial sector with their head office based in Greater Manchester. From here and their other branches in Scotland and in Slough, they undertake both emergency and planned projects nationally.

This project involved a 8-12 person team over a period of 16 weeks, and included:

• Supply and installation of safety netting and 1400lm of edge protection with 2no Haki stair towers
• Replacement of existing rooflights using GRP Evolution LC1 Class 3; 140 runs at 22m in length
• Grinding off all cut edge corrosion to all roof sheet laps
• Application of mastic and basecoat to the full roof – circa 8000m²
• Clearance of all guttering to low and high level roof areas and sealing of all gutter joints
• Thorough cleaning of all roof sheets
• MEWPs provided to accommodate all works safely

For the replacement of the 25+ year old outer sheet, the decision was to upgrade to the superior strength Zenon Evolution LC1. Unlike traditional GRP rooflights that are reinforced with short rovings, Evolution is formed using a continuous filament woven mesh of glass fibres providing very high tensile strength and resistance to tearing. This goes way beyond the minimum requirements for non-fragility. Due to the nature of the material this also means less resin is required within the manufacturing process compared to traditional reinforcement techniques, resulting in a significant reduction in embodied carbon in the finished product with no loss in performance.

Phil Seaton; Operations Director of High Access said “The rooflights were delivered promptly and competitively priced. I was pleasantly surprised on the quick lead time, which enabled us to complete the programme of works a week early. The impact on the natural daylight internally is substantial. Both client and landlord are thrilled with the results”.