Mascot Towers - transfer beam cracking 8

[Tomfh]

https://www.smh.com.au/sydney-news/...nts-in-the-basement-area-20190614-p51xwt.html

More cracking apartments. We’re doing well in Sydney at the moment...

 

[Settingsun]

To clarify, my mention of the Miami collapse was only because it is front and centre currently on this forum and is a clear contrast of strict registration, review and inspection requirements vs what Australia has, yet didn't prevent a collapse. Basically to reinforce the two points I made before mentioning Miami. Every nation has had structural catastrophes so there's no opportunity to score points.

Issues with apartment construction in NSW are undeniable even to the Liberal Party (aka conservative government elsewhere) which is traditionally friendly to private developers. But I don't think the basic system is beyond repair.

 

[rapt]

We have the same problem as the early stages Opal at the moment. We Know Nothing! There was talk of transfer beam problems, now there is a Slip beam, whatever that is. We are relying on reports from non engineer reporters who do not know what they are talking about. Pictures so far show some expansion joint problems.

RE Checking, it all comes down to the consulting engineer at the moment. I have not been involved in the design/construction side for many years, but when I was we always did inspections on our own designs and often on sites where we were simply the PT installer and not involved in design to ensure our site crews were maintaining standards. Some consultants were at that time doing "every second floor" inspections on multi storey construction. In one case where I was with a PT company, the "non checked" floor was a transfer floor. In that case, the PT installers from our company requested that I check the transfer beams as they were not being checked by the consultant. That developer/builder has gone bankrupt a couple of times since then.

My son works for a consultant in Queensland doing mostly developer controlled buildings now. They fully inspect all of their own designs before every pour.

Even for my own house (concrete floor slabs and roof and load bearing b;lock walls plus retaining walls) several years ago, the builder had all pours checked by a local consulting engineer before pouring as they had to be signed off with the certifier. I checked the checker!!

Yes, anyone can game the system. But that will happen no matter what rules are in place. My first 6 months in PT (43 years ago) were spent involved in the re-grouting of 2 floors of a 10 storey building and checking the grouting of the other 8 floors. 10 years earlier All were "inspected" by consultants and approved. All were signed off by the PT company as being fully grouted. All tendons of the top 2 floors were completely ungrouted. All tendons on the other 8 floors were fully grouted. But everything was checked and approved by PT company supervisors and consultants.

 

[Gishin1]

Completely agree with RAPT about the speculation on Mascot. Inspections are only as good as the inspector.

Compulsory technical examination for engineers to achieve RPEQ or equivalent would go a long way to limiting the number of people gaming the system however.

Then we might not have so many engineers who don't believe in punching shear, slenderness, or earthquakes etc. The ones working at boutique firms pushing the leanest designs at the lowest fees and killing the industry.

 

[human909]

I think there should be a stronger push to truly independent peer reviews process of any major construction. It makes sense, but can be difficult to implement. The problem is who is going to foot the bill and how to make it truly independent.

(There are plenty of examples in other sectors where 'independent' reviews can become quickly beholden by those they are reviewing, don't get me started about the accounting and finance industry!)

 

[Agent666]

Back in the news again, NSW building commissioner slamming the original construction/design.

Many other similar stories from the last few days.

 

[Tomfh]

That commissioners role appears to be more political than anything.

He emphasised the movement joint defect in his remarks, using it as a basis to attack the builder (and thus detract from systemic issues in the regulatory process). But that movement joint defect had been known about for years and isn’t the actual problem that’s seeing everyone evacuated. It’s being used as a bit of a red herring by the looks of its

 

[Agent666]

From a week ago. Strata documents seem to be suggesting/supporting the conclusion that the settlement that's caused the damage and subsequent evacuation is at least partly due to dewatering of the more recently built structure next door.

 

[Tomfh]

Strata documents seem to be suggesting/supporting the conclusion that the settlement that's caused the damage and subsequent evacuation is at least partly due to dewatering of the more recently built structure next door.

Yes they've been pumping, and the whole area is pretty much at sea level, so you can imagine what might be going on.


The movement joint issue is unrelated to the overall settlement issue, but is being used by the neighbours (and dissappointingly the commissioner) as a red herring.

 

[epoxybot]

Mascot Towers at risk of structural failure as new cracks emerge Link

 

[georgeverghese]

The quality / long term structural integrity of many apartment blocks in metropolitan Sydney built in the last 20years or so is worse than that in some 3rd world countries. Several large potholes in many of the untolled inner city roads,bad enough to wreck your car suspension in one bump. No dental cover, rising utility bills and council rates, societal divide with ever increasing private school fees, swelling numbers of homeless people, families broken by finanical difficulties due to inability to pay off mortgages and/ or loss of jobs, its a sharkfest for the rich and powerful.