Merry Christmas f rom

e-struct News!

Goodbye 2015—you have flown by!

What an amazing year it has been!

We have loved working on a variety

of projects over this year! We’ve

been involved in a range of Resi-

dential builds, Commercial builds,

Institutional and Industrial builds

and Community builds too. We’ve

also started our Junior Engineers

group and are thrilled at the support

for the program.

Please note that our office is closed

for the Summer break from

Wednesday 23rd December and

reopens Monday, January 4th

2016.

We wish you a wonderful Christ-

mas and a happy, healthy and

prosperous 2016.

All the best for your celebrations

with family and friends and a relax-

ing Summer break.

We’re looking forward to a fantastic

new year, helping you with your

projects.

Chris, James, Jade and Bridie

Project Profile: Lilydale Apartments

E-struct has thoroughly enjoyed engineering this

amazing project with Sharpe Homes over the past

12 months. This beautiful development features

two slick buildings, each housing four state-of-the-

art stylish apartments. Built in the heart of Lilydale,

these gorgeous homes offer twin advantages of

convenience and beauty in location. The open floor

plan in each upstairs apartment features a spa-

cious balcony with full opening stack doors that

bring the outside in. These amazing structures

required massive cantilever design to make the

large overhangs work in supporting both apart-

ments and balconies in each building.

E-struct has provided soil testing services, structur-

al and drainage design and energy rating for this

development. We have made use of TechSlab, a

brilliant system that is a quarter the weight of con-

crete and has fantastic thermal and acoustic prop-

erties. It is an especially effective system in low-

rise developments.

As the end of year approaches and everyone set-

tles into their new apartments, we wish them all the

best for their first Christmas in such elegant and

inviting homes!

ONE PLACE

COMPLETE SERVICE

ONE CHOICE e-struct News

this issue

Project Profile: Apartments P.1

Project Profile:

Engineered Canopy P.2-3

Professional Development P.2-3

Work Experience P.4

I S S U E

D e c e m b e r

2 0 1 5

06

Housing Engineer-

ing Design & Re-

search Associa-

tion (HEDRA)

Melbourne Confer-

ence: “Fixing

Heaved Slabs, pre-

paring for the next

drought and Legal

Responsibilities”

December 4th,

2015, Ibis Hotel,

Glen Waverley.

James and Chris attend-

ed this full day confer-

ence to build up on their

knowledge of slab

heave. We profiled this

problem in Issue 3 and

looked at the damage

caused by excessive

moisture at the edge of

slabs. This is mainly

caused by poor surface

drainage around the

structure.

The conference featured

speakers from a variety

of fields including: Ge-

otechnician James

McCloud, Engineering

Geologists Dominic

Lopes and Bruce Har-

greaves, Arboriculturist

Jenny Boyer, Professor

Emad Gad and Tim

Margetts QC, Barrister.

Key points included:

examining construction

EEEE----Struct Junior EngineersStruct Junior EngineersStruct Junior EngineersStruct Junior Engineers

www.facebook.com/groups/estructjuniorengineers/www.facebook.com/groups/estructjuniorengineers/www.facebook.com/groups/estructjuniorengineers/www.facebook.com/groups/estructjuniorengineers/

Project Profile:

Play Space Makeover -

Engineered

Canopies

The lucky students at Sacred Heart

Catholic School in Kew have these

amazing playgrounds to call their

own. Beneath the stylish and well

protected canopies, the kids can

play safely all year round.

We enjoyed working with Carl Saker

from Riviera Building Group and pro-

vided soil testing and structural de-

sign for this fantastic project. Carl

has been a Moorooduc Hwy Plan

Printing client for some time and it

was wonderful to be invited to consult

and collaborate on this great project,

creating this terrific play space.

The canopy has been constructed

using Danpalon® panels, a honey-

comb polycarbonate material that

ScienceScienceScienceScience

TechnologyTechnologyTechnologyTechnology

EngineeringEngineeringEngineeringEngineering

MathematicsMathematicsMathematicsMathematics Promoting kids’ STEM skills Promoting kids’ STEM skills Promoting kids’ STEM skills Promoting kids’ STEM skills Contact: juniorengineers@eContact: juniorengineers@eContact: juniorengineers@eContact: juniorengineers@e----struct.com.austruct.com.austruct.com.austruct.com.au

Find Moorooduc Hwy Plan Printing at our

e-struct off ice . We print colour or black &

white la rge format plans up to A0 , scan in black

& white up to A0 and laminate up to A2 .

For f r iend ly and prompt serv ice, emai l your p lans to

mai l@mhplanpr in t . com.au or drop in to the o f f i ce !

It’s your

www.mhplanprint.com.au

understand it…

do it…

combines innovative features. It’s wa-

tertight, strong, can be molded to fit

requirements; there are so many fea-

tures, shade cloth just can’t compete.

The light architectural glazing allows

light to travel through but protects

against UV rays. The glazing also

has excellent thermal properties, re-

ducing the temperature beneath the

canopy so that children are spared the

heat in Summer months. The design

also protects them from wind and rain

making play possible all year round.

The galvanized steel structure affords

the canopy excellent weather protec-

tion, builds in strength and creates the

added bonus of being able to span a

significant area. The space beneath

the canopy is enormous! With com-

mercial, institutional and residential

applications, there’s no stopping its

implementation.

Can you imagine the smiles on the

kids’ faces? Makes me want to go

back to school!

Discover more at www.danpalon.info

defects not meeting the

Victorian contractual ar-

rangement, specifically,

what can be classified as

‘occasional defects’ and

how defects breach the

contractual agreement

and the consequences

that follow as a result. For

instance, if low category

(0, 1, 2) defects occur

within two years of obtain-

ing certificate of occupan-

cy, the structure breaches

the contract and such de-

fects further imply that

more defects may occur.

Other issues raised includ-

ed examining methods of

determining tree effects. A

study of moisture content

in soil at a Braebrook de-

velopment found that the

South Australian method

lead to under designing

and the Victorian method

was the most consistent

approach.

Finally recent examination

of sites has determined

that less than 30% of

properties complied with

sufficient temporary down-

pipe installation to deal

with excessive moisture

on the ground adjacent to

the footings before hando-

ver. Most structures were

missing temporary down-

pipes or downpipes that

had been in place, were

removed by trades on site

in order to complete their

work and not reconnected

afterwards. Simple errors

can lead to big conse-

quences, like slab heave,

leaving builders with big

costs (Softly vs Metricon

Homes, VCAT 2014). by

James Blair & Chris Ro-

zycki.

e-struct

@estructengineer

www.e-struct.com.au

(03) 9770 1738

1300 E STRUCT (1300 378 782)

mail@e-struct.com.au

(03) 9770 1740

Stay in touch

PO Box 7095

Karingal 3199

Prefer to receive e-struct News via email or as a hard copy?

Drop Jade a line at: mail@e-struct.com.au

During September, we received an impas-sioned call from careers counsellor, Melissa Dillon, at St Peter’s College, who was trying to secure a placement for a student with an inter-est in engineering. We were happy to offer Deng Atem some time with us, and he benefit-ted from a very hands on approach to his time here. For his final day, we asked him to design a bridge for us with the specific challenge that it must be able to support weight effectively and he could only use the materials that we gave him: straws, tape and popsicle sticks.

Furthermore, he had to justify his design: “I chose this bridge design because it is strong, and strong is always reliable. While building this bridge i used more then one layer of Popsicle sticks for the edges, the edges must be the strongest because they carry most of the weight."

We used tiles for the test, each weighing 250g. The bridge held under 5.5 kilograms and then we ran out of tiles! It bowed slightly but stood strong. We were very impressed by Deng’s use of the "elbow" joints from the straws to create the ramps onto the bridge! Deng is also a tal-ented artist and drew our staff as Lego figu-rines. We think he did a great job. Congratula-tions Deng, and we wish you all the best for your engineering future.

By Jade Triffitt and Bridie Briggs

From the ground up

e-struct’s got

you covered.

How can we

help you?

one place

complete engineering

one choice

e-struct News Issue 06 December 2015

e-struct-consulting-services

estructengineer

Work Experience Student

Deng Atem, St Peter ’s College,

Cranbourne.

Pictures from the top

Deng reviews plans by

Northpoint Architecture,

many thanks for your

�me and tutelage, John

Hammond.

Deng’s bridge bows

slightly under the weight

of the �les.

Deng’s Lego portraits of

staff (top-bo$om, le%-

right): Jade, Bridie, Chris

and James.