tectural plans, thereby relieving montony of architectural expression.
A feature of housing lay-out which particularly appealed to Mr. Chow became apparent on his visit to Marly-les-Grandes-Terres, where he found an entire estate comprising nine identical clusters of apartment buildings in groups of three, com- plete with shopping centre, schools, medical clinics, theatre and post and telegraph offices on an 30-acre site. Circumscribing this large site was a single major road, with no secondary roads penetrating its interior, while each apartment group was allocated its own parking area.
"It was wonderful to note that no children had to cross a street on their way to school or to the shopping centre, and no car came in conflict with any pedestrian within the de- velopment," recalls Mr. Chow. "This is one of the ideas that must be borne in mind when planning a new housing development."
Acting on Mr. Chow's recom- mendations, Kuala Lumpur's Com missioner had already earmarked certain sites in and around the Federal capital for the construction of prefabricated flats. A disappoint- ing halt was called to one of the largest of these, on a 100-acre site at Sentul Pasar, when it was determined that the abandoned tin tailings which comprised the site would not support multi-storey flats without prohibitive expenditure on piling.
Nevertheless, the Commissioner is persevering, after learning what he described as a hard but important lesson.
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"Old tin tailings may be cheap to buy, but they are not necessarily cheap to develop.' reflected Haji Ismail. "In future I think we will have to concentrate our development efforts on comparatively costly land which, because it is firmer ground, will prove more economic in the long
run.
MULTI-STOREY PREFABRICATION UNDER TRIAL IN SINGAPORE
A SYSTEM of multi-storey pre-
fabrication which. if widely adopted. could greatly accelerate the completion of national housing pro- grammes all over South East Asia, is now under trial in Singapore.
Developed in France, and known as the Barets system, it involves pre- casting, in reinforced concrete. com- plete wall units, floor units and all other necessary building sections (all transverse wall units being load- bearing) and then hoisting them into place and assembling them to form multi-storey blocks of prefabricated flats.
In Singapore, 10 blocks of 10 storey flats (1,200 flats in all) are now being built by this method on the Singapore Housing and Develop- ment Board's Macpherson Road (South) Estate. The builders are Industrial and Engineering Structural Corporation Ltd., (known as INES- CO), a local company recently set up to market under licence the Barets system of building in Malaysia. This is the first project they have under- taken, and the first time the Barets
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system has been used in South East Asia.
The two main advantages of the Barets system are increased building speed and lower costs. Building speed is claimed to be about three times that of conventional methods, so that, once the workers have become suffi- ciently skilled in the techniques in- volved, a standard ten-storey block of Housing Board flats should take only about four months to complete, instead of about a year as at present. The elimination of complicated scaf folding, special formwork, etc., re- duces building costs, and labour costs are also lower.
The principle is that all sections-- walls, (complete with windows, door spaces, etc.), internal partitions, floors, stairs, balconies, etc. are precast (in a casting shed on the site) in the form of standard, reinforced- concrete slabs. In the case of wall slabs, these measure about 8 ft. 2 in. high by 11 ft. to 16 ft. wide, stan. dard thickness being 4 in.
Each of these standard slabs is lifted into position as required by means of a crane. Before being
These sites will, however, almost certainly be of much smaller size than the site envisaged at Sentul Pasar, because Kuala Lumpur's tre- mendous expansion since Malaya gained its independence in 1957 has already absorbed virtually all the larger tracts of land on the market. Despite this limitation, both Haji Ismail and Mr. Chow are confident that prefabrication can still be prac tised on the smaller sites.
Mr. Chow foresees the day when factories turning ont prefabricated building parts are set up at various strategic points throughout Malaysia, each serving a radius of some 40 miles. Once these factories are operating at an economic production capacity. he believes that building costs will be reduced by as much as 10 per cent. And a contract for flat construction which now takes 14 months to discharge would take no more than five under the prefabrica- tion process.
bonded to the adjacent slabs, the slab rests on special steel props so that it can be correctly aligned and plumbed. Grooves are provided in the edges of the slabs to assist in grouting, and, at intervals, lengths of steel dowel protrude. These mate with holes in adjacent slabs thus strengthening the bond and helping in aligning the slabs.
In this form of load-bearing-wall structure, particular care has to be taken to ensure that the foundations are absolutely level. A tolerance of only plus or minus in. is allowed after screeding.
Prefabricating the Slabs
The concrete used in prefabricat ing the slabs is mixed on the site. The mixing plant consists of a German Elba mixer capable of pro- ducing about 10 cu. ft. of concrete per mix; its maximum mixing capa- city is about 26 cu. yd. per hour. Above the mixer and connected to it by a chute are a cement silo and a scraper which collects batches of sand and aggregate, as required from adjacent bins and delivers them to the mixer.
concrete
After mixing, the batches of wet are taken to the casting shed either by crane skip or dumper, and poured into casting moulds. These are mainly concrete plates with steel shuttering at the sides.
THE HONG KONG & FAR EAST BUILDER-VOLUME 19, NUMBER 1
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