No_6_April_1961 — Page 40

The new Kodak building in Singapore has 24-hours-a-day air conditioning for its processing department and...

NEWEST contribution to the in.

dustrialisation programme

of Singapore State is the new building of Messrs. Kodak (Malaya) Ltd. in Alexandra Road, Singapore, on land leased by the National Development Board.

Opening of these new premises means that certain processing opera- tions of films and prints which were previously carried out overseas will now be done in the new laboratories, together with a development in the graphic arts to aid the advertising of locally manufactured goods.

The building is one block, the front portion in two storeys and the rear in one. The showrooms and demonstration areas, 4,000 sq.ft., are accommodated on the ground floor of the front block. The administra- tive offices, 4,000 sq.ft., are above this.

The rear portion, 21,000 sq.ft., houses the godowns, processing laboratories, plant room and canteen. The main godown is air-conditioned for twenty-four hours of the day and has strict temperature and humidity control. With the exception of the canteen and plant room the remaind er of the entire building is air- conditioned during working hours only.

There are numerous services for the processing section such as chilled water and water at normal tempera- ture for mixing to the required tem- peratures in the respective operations of chemical mixing and developing.

Mixed chemicals are agitated by nitrogen under pressure, compressed air is piped to certain processing rooms. Chemicals are mixed on the ground floor, pumped up to a special tank farm housing over the rear of

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VERTICAL ALUMINIUM LO

FEATURE

the godown and then fed through P.V.Č. pipe lines by gravity to the respective distribution points.

Once a processing operation has begun it must continue without in- terruption and to ensure this storage tanks have been provided for water, pumps are duplicated, air-condition- ing cooling towers are interchange- able with those for chilled water, certain electrical lighting and power lines are wired back to the main board for operation by a standby generator which is manually controll- ed, the essential emergency lines being operated by push button con- trols on the main panel.

Communication systems have been installed throughout to facilitate control. These are the telephone. dictograph, call system and pneuma- tic tube delivery system. Goods in and out of the godown are handled on portable conveyors.

machines

The air-conditioning have all been erected on the roof of the godown and processing areas, housed in insulated aluminium struc. tures to save space within the build- ing and to minimize the complication of ducts, chilled water pipe lines and condensate drains.

The building is a reinforced con- crete framework with suspended floors and roofs supported on rein- forced concrete piles, the planning grid being on a six foot module. giving bays of thirty feet by twenty- four feet in the godown and proces- sing areas and a clear span of thirty feet throughout for the showroom and office.

The cloaking is of 9-inch brick- work plastered outside for the rear portion but in 2-inch wide brick facings to the showroom and office.

FRONT

The principal feature of the main front is the span of vertical alum- inium louvres, sixteen feet high, set at an angle to protect the windows. which extend from floor to ceiling, from the afternoon sun,

A further set of louvres, eight feet high, close the front of the porch which extends for the full length of the showroom and serves to screen the showroom from the sun and glare. This porch is sufficiently wide for visitors' cars to be parked while allowing space for another car to pass through the porch.

The showroom is in several sections, firstly. the sales counter and display, secondly, the theaterelte fitted with automatic curtains along one side and lighting controlled by dimmer switch. Normally the

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Kodal

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