Day 27: Skytower Tour

With Dr. Burt in from traveling and ready to adventure, we visited a Hutchinson Builders job, which was to become Brisbane's tallest building at 274m. This building has some of the most unique methods implemented, including an entire building slip-form. Typically, shear walls (the structural core of the building, typically solid concrete walls which form the elevator shafts or staircases) have a wall form that can be jacked up and placed for the next pour, without having to disassemble and reassemble all the walls. A lot of jobs require a crane to lift these sections to the next level, but the industry has transitioned to self-climbers, especially for buildings over ten or so stories. What differs on this project is that the entire structure is one massive slip form... The entire deck moves up, pouring the columns and shear walls together, and the slab deck is then poured below. The slab formwork is a system of decking and shores, which are braced from the floors below. As decks are completed, the formwork is wrecked and moved up to the floor via a buckhoist, where it is reassembled and utilized for another pour.

This process revolutionizes the construction process in ways our industry has simply accepted as fact and unavoidable issues. First, the concrete slab is poured underneath the above column deck, which means that the impacts of weather are minimized and virtually eliminated. Second, rodbusters and other trades aren't laying reinforcements and installing sleeves in the blistering sun; they're cool and shaded throughout the process which drastically improves worker production and happiness. Thirdly, the accuracy of columns floor-to-floor is much more accurate, as the process is more controlled and easier to check. This reduces the lengthy time required for layout, and minimizes the chances of error. Our entire group was blown away and I must admit I've never seen anything like it, nor did I ever think something on that scale of magnitude was achievable.