Alconbury Weald Club Building

Alconbury Weald Club Building

Playfords Ltd won the contract to supply the electrical services for the Alconbury Weald Club Building – a new building of CLT timber frame construction for the entire building.

The prestigious building was constructed for Urban and Civic, the developers of the Alconbury Weald site in Alconbury near Huntingdon, with specifications for a high quality installation and finishes. The 1st phase of this challenging project began in September 2015 and was completed in December 2015 with a 2nd phase consisting of a new Gym fit out starting in June 2016 and completing in August 2016. The project was further complicated by the installation of an extensive audio/visual installation requirement which was added as a variation during the course of the contract.

All of the services were required to be concealed however the timber frame construction made this difficult and when an acoustic floor was installed we used the void to conceal the majority of the services within the building.

All services were routed in trunkings, cable trays and baskets within the acoustic floor including lighting, power, data, fire alarms, security, CCTV and access control resulting in a minimum level of exposed conduit etc. enhancing the full aesthetics of the timber framed building construction which pleased the client immensely.

The project was particularly challenging as the acoustic floor was sealed, therefore all of the services had to be fully installed and tested before the floor was laid and all aspects of the installation including future proofing were incorporated into the design and installation requirements.

The 2nd phase Gym fit out was completed to a very short project programme and involved complex liaison with all trades to co-ordinate works within this small area. The gym comprises of a ground floor reception and changing areas complete with LED lighting throughout, first floor main gym area comprising of power, data and TV supplies throughout the floor area, LED lighting within the main and gym area complete with daylight dimming controls and an audio system throughout the 1st floor. Within the 2nd floor studio we have provided LED lighting, again daylight dimming, high performance projector and electrically retractable screen as well as power, data and TV supplies throughout this floor.

In addition, within this phase of works Playfords provided an additional Sub-main on the plant deck to provide power supplies for the air handling units and heat recovery within the gym.

Following completion of the Club Building including the Gym Playfords installed and commissioned a new Power Factor Correction unit onto the building to optimise the power network within the building and encourage further energy savings for the end user.

Extensive audio/visual facilities were provided in all of the meeting rooms and within the gym including large display screens, projectors, projection screens and fully automated audio facilities to sense and activate when laptops or PCs are plugged into the system including electric projection screens which drop when a projector is energised.

We also provided further audio/visual facilities to the Main Conference Hall including an automatic large format projector, sound systems, and electric microphones with the facility to provide videos and external presentations, SKY TV, Terrestrial TV and radio via the internet to play background music in the ground floor cafeteria.

In Reception an Information Display Screen was installed to provide up to date information on activities throughout the building and site with a live news feed using a ONELAN software system to deliver the information which can be updated in real time to welcome guests and visitors to the building.