Innovations unveiled - Canam Asia
Monday, 29th March 2004
Canam Asia, a Saudi-Canadian joint venture, recently highlighted roofing and flooring system solutions for the region at a series of technical seminars.
New concepts being applied to solve roofing and flooring challenges relating to the Gulf's construction industry were demonstrated by experts from Canam Asia Limited (CAL) and the Canam Manac Group (Canada) at a series of seminars that took place in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and the UAE recently.
Ideally suited to the construction of low, medium and high-rise buildings and commercial centres, the objective of the 'Canam Open Web Joist System' events, which were held by CAL, a joint venture between Zamil Industrial Investment Company (ZIIC) and Steel Plus Limited, a subsidiary of Canam Manac Group (Canada), were to create an awareness of the advantages of the 'Open Web Joist', 'Composite Steel Deck' and 'Hambro Composite Floor System' concepts.
According to Walid Chaarani, General Manager, CAL, the increasing popularity of these construction concepts is underscored by the many advantages they offer as well as the fact that they are custom designed, fabricated and supplied from a local manufacturing base in Saudi Arabia.
"Open-web steel joists are ideal for floors and roofs in all types of steel and concrete buildings and offer substantial weight and cost savings. As such they can be economically used for long column-free spans due to their high load-bearing-capacity-to-weight ratio, offering more open interior space," said Georges Hage-Chahine, Vice President International, Canam Manac Group.
"Representing unitized construction, open web steel joists can be installed immediately upon arriving at a job site as no forming, pouring, curing or stripping is required. Combined with their light weight, this ensures a fast and simple erection procedure, which is welcome news for the industry in the Middle East," added Richard Vincent, Vice President Engineering Research & Development, Canam Manac Group, who along with Pierre Gignac, Vice President Engineering Canam Systems, Canam Manac Group, jointly presented the seminars with Mr Chaarani and Jean El Khoury, Regional Sales Manager, CAL.
Adding to the benefits, the erection and bridging of the joists creates a working platform for the immediate follow up of allied trades, which enables the rapid and efficient progression of fieldwork.
"The configuration of the steel joists allows the passage and concealment of pipes, ducts and electric conduits within the depth of the floor. This eliminates the need for extra height inside the buildings and further reduces overall costs. In addition, open web steel joists - in combination with other materials - can provide fire resistive assemblies for nearly any hourly rating required," added Mr Gignac.
The Hambro Composite Floor joist system, an advanced up-to-date answer to elevated floor construction challenges, combines 'Hambro' steel joists with poured concrete, creating hybrid concrete / steel T-beams running in one direction and an integrated continuous slab in the other.
"The numerous advantages in terms of construction flexibility, efficiency and cost reduction offered by these systems were warmly received by the attending audiences which comprised representatives from different Engineering Consultants, Contractors, Real Estate Developers, and owners," added Mr El Khoury.
These advantages include efficiencies of high strength steel, speed and ease of erection, low self-weight of roofing and floor construction allowing for smaller columns and foundations and the possibility of increased bay dimensions, thereby reducing the number of joists and columns required.
Adding to the list of benefits are simplified building erection, greater floor plan layout flexibility, maximized ceiling height, due to installation of ducts through the joist web systems, easy adaptation to acoustical insulation systems, and long-term resistance to fire for floor and roof compositions as established by the Underwriters Laboratories (UL).
CAL is undertaking work on several prestigious projects using these innovative construction concepts. These include commercial centers such as the 'PANDA' project in Riyadh and 'the First Finance' project in Qatar; high-rise buildings such as the 'Charles DeGaulle' project in Romania; low rise buildings such as 'The World Trade and Business Center' in the UAE, as well as various other projects in different countries.