Diversifying business to include structures built from modern building materials has seen one Queensland contractor reduce risk, capture new opportunities and enhance overall business resilience.
Gold Coast contractors, Custom Edge Building, were subcontracted by SMC Marine to construct a 447-metre boardwalk on Lake Orr at Varsity Lakes for City of Gold Coast from Wagners Composite Fibre Technologies (CFT) Fibre Reinforced Polymer (FRP); a modern composite material made from resin and glass fibres.
Director, Indi Capper said using FRP for the first time in construction was overall a very positive experience and one that will change his business quite a lot.
“Lake Orr was our first FRP project for Custom Edge Building and it probably took us 2-3 weeks before we really got our heads around how to construct using the product and coming up with a system that was going to be the quickest and most efficient way to get the job done,” Indi Capper said.
Pictured – the 447-metre Lake Orr boardwalk will provide critical links between business precincts, community services and residential properties. Photo by @brockmamedia.
“Initially it felt quite different to working with timber or steel and you’ve got to think two or three steps ahead so you can accurately pre-drill holes; but once we got our heads around the system it was really quick.”
“The Lake Orr project wasn’t a straight run for us like you’d get with a new boardwalk build; there were tight curves, different heights and everything had to be done on site,” he said.
“But with FRP everything is dead straight so you’re not worrying about variations in thickness and heights, knots in the timber or even the weight of building with steel, so these things added to our productivity and we were able to set a good pace on the construction.”
Pictured – FRP piles were driven from a barge on Lake Orr.
SMC Marine did the demolition of the old timber boardwalk and concrete piles on the Lake Orr project before driving FRP piles for the new boardwalk.
“Yeah there was no piling or demolition for us, SMC Marine had the barges and boats and they did the new FRP piles. We came through after them and installed the bearers, joists, brackets and decking which was really good for us playing catch up with SMC Marine,” Indi Capper said.
“I know the decision to take on this job will change my business quite a lot; I’ve already been approached by another contractor on the Gold Coast to tender for another project being built out of FRP and now our team has worked with it I am going into this tender process with a lot more confidence and I know the time frames we can put things together in.”
“Modern building materials are the way of the future and diversifying my business to include capabilities in this space is a game changer for us,” he said.
Pictured – FRP is the perfect solution for this project as there are low maintenance requirements, and the product has a 100-year design life.
Meanwhile, SMC Marine Project Manager, Hugh Egan-O’Neill said the success of the Lake Orr project hinged on a combination of great material, fast response times on design changes and excellent productivity from the sub-contractor.
“The old timber boardwalk at Lake Orr was a bit of an eyesore, it was up and down all over the place and looked like there were sets of waves running up the timber where it had heaved and sunk over the past 20 years,” Hugh Egan-O’Neill said.
“The client was looking to sharpen up the visual appearance of the boardwalk and they wanted something that was fairly well maintenance free.”
“Our biggest challenge on the job was two-fold; firstly we needed to make the new boardwalk level as possible, tying into existing infrastructure that was not level and secondly height restrictions required the majority of the boardwalk to have an in-plane substructure design,” he said.
“Due to the discovery of unforeseen issues with the existing retaining wall which the boardwalk was attached to, which were only revealed after deconstruction work began, design modifications to the substructure were necessary.”
“These included reducing the substructure member sizes due to height restrictions below, thus reducing pile spans and increasing quantities and modifying connections to miss non structural sections of the wall.”
Pictured – An in-plane design for the joists and bearers was deployed owing to height restrictions created by an existing retaining wall.
SMC Marine needed to drive all the piles for the boardwalk from the water rather than from land due to access restrictions in different sections of the boardwalk; this process was made easier owing to the lightweight nature of the FRP piles.
“Piling from the water wasn’t new for us but piling utilising FRP piles was and the lightweight nature of the product made it really easy to handle and very easy to work with when installing,” Hugh Egan-O’Neill said.
“We would pre-auger a hole to get through the rock then vibrate them with a vibrator plate and use a 1 tonne hammer to drive them to the required embedment and set,” Hugh Egan-O’Neill said.
“We needed to do pile dynamic analysis testing on the driven piles, which required attaching strain gauges to the piles which there was definitely learnings but given the opportunity to drive FRP on another project I wouldn’t be afraid of it; I would definitely do them again now we’ve got the experience.”
“I was also really impressed with the engineering turnaround times on this job. When you are tying into existing structures you don’t know until you start a demo what design changes are going to be needed and to work with a business that can get those design changes done really quick and then deliver the manufactured product to reflect those changes was top-notch,” he said.
“We would definitely look to partner with Wagners CFT on a job similar to this in the future; there was just no real problem with the Lake Orr build and we could pretty much do anything with FRP, it was pretty impressive.”
“This build was supposed to be completed in multiple stages where we would build a section then open it up before moving onto the next stage; but we progressed so well and the speed of construction was such that we did it in one go which was great for the client, and great for the community.”
Pictured – The new Lake Orr boardwalk has been really well received by the local community. Photo by @brockmanmedia.
Feedback from the client and community was also extremely pleasing.
“The final product was very impressive and local residents have been really happy with the result,” Hugh Egan-O’Neill said.
“You don’t usually get much feedback on jobs like this and usually they can be negative with people not liking change; but we got an enormous amount of positive feedback on the Lake Orr project from how it looked, to the paintwork, the design.”
“It’s really boosted the local people to use the boardwalk for walks and runs and alot more people are using it than they ever did before,” he said.
“We’ve even had people comment that the boardwalk has lifted the entire community space so much that residential housing prices have been boosted in the area.”
The Lake Orr boardwalk near Varsity Lakes Hospital and Bond University was designed by Wagners CFT to provide a critical link between business precincts, community services and residential properties.
For more details on the project and to watch a time-lapse of the build visit https://www.wagnerscft.com.au/project/varsity-lakes-lake-orr-gold-coast/
To get in contact with Custom Edge Building call Indi Capper on 0423 368 662 or email him at customedgebuilding@gmail.com
To find out more about SMC Marine and their capabilities visit https://www.smcmarine.com.au
