Dew Piling Ltd is currently working on a project to refurbish a listed lock at Bo’ness harbour, helping to form a marina of impounded water. Main Contractor Lagan Construction awarded the £150,000 contract to Dew Piling who have considerable experience in marine work and have worked previously on tidal lock structures, most recently at Ouseburn. Dew Piling appointed RG Parkins of Kendal to carry out the detailed design.

Dew Piling will complete a temporary sheet pile cofferdam within the existing lock structure by mid-June. Two lines of 21 piles, 10 – 12.5m long, will be pitched into position with a crane. Rather than being driven into the ground, the piles will be held by a frame and will rest on the existing concrete base. They will then be sealed, making a water retaining structure. In September, once Lagan Construction have carried out their work within the cofferdam, the piles will be removed.

Dew Piling Ltd secures four London 2012 Aquatics Centre contracts

Companies across the Northwest are benefiting from the construction phase of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, including work being carried out on the Aquatics Centre.

Oldham-based piling company Dew Piling won a contract to provide a sheet pile cut-off wall for the venue which, once completed, will house two 50m swimming pools, a diving pool and dry diving area.

Dew Piling business development manager Ian Hood said: "We received an invitation to tender from the tier one contractor on the Aquatics Centre, to price for the sheet pile cut-off wall for the perimeter of the site, which stops water entering the site during the excavation works."

The wall is now in place and the Dew Piling team are due back in the spring to remove the piles, once the excavation work is complete.

Since winning the contract, Dew Piling - which employs 27 people, 25 of which are based at its Oldham head office - has successfully bid for three other jobs on the Aquatics Centre.

The company won contracts to provide three temporary cofferdams, another cofferdam for a river bridge structure, and the installation of steel tubes for the supports to the temporary grandstand. All three projects have now been completed.

The four projects are worth a total of £1.6 million.

Dew Piling Ltd has been commissioned by Galliford Try to design and install piling for a basement car park on a project to build an apartment block adjacent to the new London Olympic site.

On a contract worth £450,000, Dew Piling has installed permanent sheet piles to support the existing roads and houses. The installation of sheet pile walls for the underground car park is well under way and should complete on schedule by the end of January.

The company’s 2 Tosa silent pile-presses are coming into their own as they are specifically designed for these situations, minimising vibration and noise and hence avoiding disturbance to properties nearby.

The site has dense gravels overlying stiff clays, so the ground was pre-augered with a 12/15 ABI leader rig to allow the installation of the 416 no. 9m to 11m 3w sheet piles by the TOSAs combined with high pressure water jets. In order to help create the watertight seal required for the basement, the toe of each pile has to reach the underlying clay. Once the basement piling is complete, Dew Piling will then clutch weld the basement piles for waterproofing and install a puddle flange.

The piling crews worked through heavy snow to keep to schedule. Exceptionally low temperatures meant that the equipment had to be continually treated with various anti-freezing methods to avoid any frost damage and associated delay.

FK Lowry Piling has completed the foundation project for a £100 million hospital redevelopment in Belfast as part of a major capital programme to improve health provision across Northern Ireland.

FKL was commissioned by McLaughlin Harvey to construct the foundations for a 13-storey critical care unit at Royal Victoria Hospital. The hospital had undergone a significant first phase rebuild in recent years.

Advanced preparations for the £3.6 million specialist foundation package for Phase 2B began in summer 2007, followed by the enabling works and two further visits to deliver the main contract. FKL used a range of piling techniques in addition to soil nailing, rock bolting and spraying concrete facades, working in difficult ground conditions on an enclosed site.

To reduce the impact of the piling works – and in line with its eco-friendly working practices - FKL took positive steps to eliminate pollution, reduce waste materials and monitor noise and dust levels.

Since the project completion, FKL has been awarded a further contract to connect the twostorey basement to the proposed Women and Children’s Hospital via a contiguous retaining wall tunnel and bearing piles. The scheme will require the installation of some 125 600mm diameter piles retaining up to 8.5m in addition to around 80 600mm diameter bearing piles. Work is due to start in February 2010.

FK Lowry Piling is delivering its largest ever project for long term client Sisk on behalf of aircraft manufacturer Shorts/Bombardier Aerospace.

The £1.5 million contract, which is currently ahead of programme, involves the piling works for the perimeter and foundations for a new assembly plant for the C Series business jet.

The new facility will enable Bombardier to step up production of the CRJ700 and 900 regional jets at its Belfast factory, which already manufactures the majority of the key components – including the wings and some of the fuselage.

FKL was initially contracted to install 1,200 355mm2 piles and 1,800 270mm2 piles for perimeter of the building. The work was later expanded to include a further 1,000 precast piles for the building slab after trials carried out by a specialist subcontractor failed due to the presence of artesian water pressures.

As a result, the foundation design was altered to specify driven precast piles and FKL was awarded the additional work. The project is due for completion in the autumn.

FK Lowry Piling is nearing the completion of piling works for Scheme 3 of the DBFO 2 road project at Ballygawley.

Commissioned by the Lagan Ferrrovial joint venture at Killymoyle, County Tyrone the works have involved the installation of precast concrete piles over a peat bog over which an earth embankment will be constructed to support part of the new road.

The contract began in May with two rigs employed to drive 1,154 concrete piles of 270mm2 and 355mm2.

FKL is also installing the pile caps and cross beams on the piles to support the ‘load transfer platform’ on which the embankment will be constructed. The pile caps are cast on site, while the cross beams are precast at FKL’s yard in Lisburn and later installed on site.

Due to the nature of the load transfer platform, particular care and attention was required by the crews to ensure the piles were installed as close to vertical as possible, since eccentric loads could have caused problems with the design.

Work has just commenced at the new Critical Care Unit at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast.

On completion in 2012 it will include a new A & E department, 40 bed intensive care unit, gynaecological facilities and medical record storage.

Roadmix is supplying all of the concrete – some 20,000m3 – to the main contractor and to sister company, FK Lowry who are carrying out the piling works.

Roadmix was the preferred concrete supplier due to our experience in completing large scale pours in constricted city centre sites and our ability to provide first class technical and operational support.

The DirectRoute consortium comprising Lagan Holdings Ltd, Strabag AG, John Sisk & Son (Holdings) Ltd, Roadbridge Ltd and equity providers Meridiam Infrastructure Finance S.C.A. SICAR and Allied Irish Banks contracted with the National Roads Authority for Design, Build, Finance and Operation of the Limerick South Ring Scheme.

The Scheme will incorporate a tolled fourth crossing of the River Shannon by a 900m long Immersed Tube, the construction of 10 km of new dual carriageway, associated link roads and four grade separated junctions.

As member of the Construction Joint Venture company Lagan Construction undertook the construction of the Euro 13 million tunnel temporary works on the north and south banks of the River Shannon.

The South Cut & Cover Cofferdam is 133m long and 30m wide and is constructed in weak fluvial soil 15m to 17m deep overlying limestone.

The North Float Out Structure is 122m long and 30m wide is constructed in weak fluvial soil 18m to 2.5m deep overlying limestone.

Full details on the progress of this scheme can be found on the project website: www.limericktunnel.com

Lagan Construction working in joint venture with Amey and Ferrovial SA has been appointed as the Main Contractor for this major roads PFI scheme.

The £250m DBFO package 2 for the Roads Service is for the design, build, finance and operation of 3 separate schemes.

Scheme 1: The A1 between Sprucefield and Cloghogue is of strategic and economic importance, providing an essential link to the ports of Belfast, Warrenpoint and Dublin. It involves 12.1 km of new dual 2 lane all purpose carriageway from Beechhill to Cloghogue. 7.5 km of this route will be off-line and 4.6km of the route will be constructed on-line. The new 2 lane dual carriageway will require the construction of 20 structures ranging in size from an agricultural underpass to a 190m long viaduct.

Scheme 2: Specific safety improvements are required along the A1 between Sprucefield and Loughbrickland. These improvements include the provision of four grade-separated junctions and the closure of centre reserve cross-over in the immediate vicinity of these junctions.

Scheme 3: Upgrade of 20.5km of the A4 between Dungannon and Ballygawley as a partially on-line/partially off-line (14.5 km off-line, 6km on-line) high quality dual carriageway will incorporate a number of grade separated junctions and central median safety barrier and hard shoulders.

This US $70 million project, complted in December 2007, for the Puerto Rico Port Authority was delivered on a live airfield in pre-planned phases. Careful planning and consultation was carried out with Luis Munoz airport operations team to plan work methods and safe access.

Pavement quality concrete was produced on site using a new 200m3 per hour concrete batching plant.

The works involved the excavation of the existing concrete runway and taxiways and the laying of 127,000m3 of Pavement Quality Concrete. The airport's entire AGL System was also upgraded.

80,000m3 of granular base and 40,000t of Asphalt were layed during the delivery of this contract.

FK Lowry Piling Project

Contractor: JJ Rhatigans Scheme: includes approx 1650dia secant wall, approx 1500No anti-flotation tension piles Value: Westgate contract value approx 3M euros, Heuston Square contract value approx 1M euros

2No CFA piling rigs complete 537 linear meters of 900dia & 750dia secant wall. These high torque rigs drilled almost 13km of hard Dublin boulder clay to form the retaining wall for a 3-storey basement. Before excavation of the basement, the wall was pinned back using approx 160No ground anchors. The retained height is some 14m.

The contract was completed with a lot of hard work on and off-site and was a great success. A second phase of work is due to commence early 08 to complete a further 100m of secant wall.

Further works on site commenced late July under the title of 'Heuston Square’ when FK Lowry returned to site to install approx 1500No anti-floatation tension piles. These piles will be installed within the 14m deep basement over the next 2years in a number of phases.

FK Lowry Piling

Victoria Square, Belfast

Contractor: Farrans Scope: CFA & Bored Rigs, approx 1500 piles Value: £4.2m

The landmark Victoria Square development in Belfast City Centre will comprise retail outlets and entertainment venues in addition to apartments and a two storey underground carpark.

This £4.2 million piling contract is the largest single piling contract seen in Northern Ireland in recent years taking place over a year’s duration in a FK Lowry Piling/Stent Foundations joint venture.

Piles were designed for tensile and compressive loads and were installed inside the 10m deep basement and outside it. Rock sockets of up to 4 metres are underlying clay and gravels.

600 dia CFA 1219 No 750 dia CFA 125 No 750 dia bored 132 No 219 dia bottom driven mini piles 24 No

Vicarage Field Shopping Centre is 160,000 sq.ft. of prime retail strategically located in the heart of Barking directly adjacent to the mainline and underground rail station and is the dominant retail offer in Barking Town Centre. Purchase in joint venture with Mar Properties.

The Shopping Centre will benefit further from the new above ground tram/bus links which will pass by the front entrance and which are being installed as part of the major infrastructure upgrade happening in advance of the 2012 Olympics making Barking a prime geographical position at the heart of the Thames Gateway. The new transport network will make Barking accessible to the Olympic venues south of the Thames.

Vicarage Field's strong 55 tenant line-up includes tenants such as Asda, WH Smith, New Look, Evans, Burton & Argos.

Contract Period: May 2004 – April 2005 Contract Value: US$35.4m Client: The Airport Authority, Nassau International Airport

This Project No. 63478-01 includes new construction and rehabilitation of runways, taxiway and aprons including runway/taxiway lighting, signing and pavement markings and drainage.

Contract Period :Jan 2003 – May 2003 Contract Value :£2.83M Client: Ministry of Public Works and Communications, Guyana

Pre-overlay repairs, milling and replacing of asphalt to depths of 300mm. Milling of existing asphalt and concrete and approx, 11,500 m3 of asphalt overlays. Permanent pavement markings and 90,000 m2 of runway grooving. Also associated AGL and electrical works.

Date of Contract: July 2002 – April 2004 Contract Value: £11 million Client: Government of St.Lucia

The Works consist of the reconstruction of 28km of roadway between Soufriere to Black Bay through Choiseul, including the construction of several bridges, drainage, road furniture, utility relocation etc. The works are divided into two sections as follows: RDP001 approximately 14km between Soufriere and Choiseul RDP002 approximately 14km between Choiseul and Black Bay.

Contract Period: Jan 2003 – July 2004 Contract Value: £10.61M Client: Maldives Airport Company Limited

Design, Build and Finance contract for the installation of new Runway Lighting System, purchase of Ground Handling Equipments, construction of a new terminal building (120m x 40m), construction and installation of fuel farm and purchase of fire vehicle. Design Partner : Babtie Group Ltd.