June_1967 — Page 5

world news

Japanese Curtain Wall Technique Exported to United States

A JAPANESE technique of producing light-weight and dur- able aluminium alloy curtain walls for buildings will shortly be exported to the United States.

Tokyo Curtainwalf Ltd, and Kubota Iron & Machin- ery Works Ltd., both of Tokyo, have signed a contract with Reynolds International, Inc. of Richmond, Virginia. to extend instructions to the US firm in building two factories based on the process in the US and to offer con- sultant services in their operation. The contract provides for three-way cooperation in future development of the process, promotion of worldwide sales of products con- cerned as well as supply of all Japanese know-how involved.

The product, known as Alcast, is produced by mixing aluminium either with silicon or magnesium depending on desired colours and casting them in sand moulds. It has been used on a number of modern Japanese buildings.

UK Consultants Win Danish Bridge Competion

A PRIZE of £2,500 has been awarded to White, Young and Partners, consulting engineers of London, for their design of the proposed 12-mile road rail bridge linking the Danish islands of Funen and Zealand.

The design calls for twin multi-span open bridges in prestressed concrete, supported on reinforced and pre- stressed concrete piers carried on piles and caissons. Each bridge will carry one rail track and three lanes of traffic. plus an emergency lane.

The deck structure will be formed of a constant depth prestressed concrete box girder with the road carried on the upper flange and the railway running through the box. section. The piers will be constructed in situ and the deck structure will be precast at suitable locations on land.

The piers are of three types “I," "V" and main, de- pending on the span required and the clearance above water level. It was considered that, aesthetically, as the

Model and sketch plans for a proposed Museum of London to be sited at the south west corner of the Barbican area have been approved in principle by the City of London Corporation. Planned around an inner garden court, the museum will be reach by a raised walk culminating in a solid rotunda leading to the entrance hall. There will be three storeys above ground and two more below.

The complex will incorporate a 14-storey office tower raised above one end of the museum on free-standing columns. Archi- tects are Powell and Moya, and structural engineers, Charles Weiss and Partners.

clearance above water level increases, so the spans should increase, but to do this and maintain standard repetitive precast sections would present problems. For standardisa- tion of the deck structure, the spacing between the top of the V-shaped piers will be kept constant for three succes- sive piers before changing in length for the next group of three piers, and so on. This will enable 24 identical units to be cast for each group of piers when both carriage- ways on the east and west channels are considered. The suspended span is always constant in length, at 69 m. for all approach spans.

The maximum height of the bridge deck is 220 ft. above water level, and the maximum clear spans are 1,130 ft. Cost of the whole scheme is put at £100 million.

Offshore Office Building Planned

THE Kurt Orban Co. Inc., has announced plans to con- struct America's first offshore office building, located in the Hudson River, 200 ft. off Jersey City, NJ.

The 12-storey building to cost US$3.4 million, will have a surrounding elevated roadway which will serve as a bumper to fend off barges. The first floor will be 50.

Artist's impression of White, Young and Partners' design for the Funen-to-Zealand road/rail bridge

Far East Architect & Builder June, 1967

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