Fire safety - Bradcore's composite panels
The new, state of the art, George Weston Foods Chullora bakery, designed by architects GHD, is a striking blend of style and function, designed to produce up to 104 million loaves of such famous brands as Tip Top bread and Golden Crumpets and Pikelets.
Following the fire that destroyed their previous Sydney bakery, the building’s insurers were very concerned about fire safety in the new bakery. It required FM Global Class 1 classified walling panels. The building features over 2200m2 of Bradcore’s Paroc rockwool cored composite panels in internal walls between the main baking hall and the hotplate lines and around the main packaging store.
Paroc panels fall into Group 1 of the Classification of Fire Wall and Ceiling Materials of the Building Code of Australia. Paroc satisfies the requirements of FM Global Class 1 and is also certified by the Loss Prevention Certification Board Limited (LPCB).
“We selected Bradcore’s Paroc panels for the partitions due to their fire performance and their ease of cleaning,” Ashley Smith of GHD says. “They also met our insulation needs, while allowing us to easily span up to 11.85m with minimum framework.”
Paroc panels are erected using specially designed fixing angles at the top of the wall. This allows movement, yet maintains a fire seal during a fire. Project manager, Steve Doughty of George Weston Foods was also pleased with Bradcore’s composite panels and the speed of installation by Vac-Clad Metal Cladding Systems. ” The installation went really smoothly, full marks to the installation crew,” Doughty says
With a non-combustible structural rockwool core, the panels have been fire-tested and BRANZ appraised to deliver Fire Resistance Levels (FRL’s) of up to -/240/240. Similarly, thermal resistance R-values of up to R5.5 (m2K/W) can be achieved for the panel.
Bradcore is currently the exclusive distributor of Paroc Panels in Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific Islands and South East Asia. Bradcore will shortly release its new Rokcore panel range, manufactured using Paroc technology to provide the same high levels of performance, with the additional benefits of lower costs and shorter lead times.
6-Nov-2006