As you already might know, Peikko’s bolted column connections are a cost-effective way to erect columns and they make your construction process much faster and safer without the need of temporary bracing. They are also suitable for many different situations and work basically in any environment. Peikko’s products are reliable and safe in difficult conditions. But don’t just take my word for it – see the examples below.
Kemi SnowCastle, Finland
In February this year, an interesting building opened to welcome its customers: an all-year-around SnowCastle. The SnowCastle locates inside a hotel building, in a separate part that is kept cold at all times while the rest of the hotel functions in normal temperatures. Kemin Matkailu Oy’s CEO Susanna Koutonen stated that they wanted the premises to be designed as durable as possible and structures so strong that they can bring in 100,000 kilos of ice.
The conditions for construction were challenging since the SnowCastle hotel was built partly underground and by the sea. Also due to the cold winters in Finland, the building has to bear the harsh weather conditions and tolerate the weight of snow and ice. In addition, the SnowCastle hotel is located in a central place and had people and activities near all the time during the construction, which created more challenges. It was important to ensure that the hotel’s current customers were disturbed as little as possible.
Due to the reasons stated above, the client decided to build with precast elements and use Peikko’s products. With bolted column connections, they were able to have a strong and durable frame that would carry the weight of the SnowCastle and face the problems with weather conditions easily. On top of that, erecting a column and building the frame was fast with precast and bolted connections so the disturbance to the customers lasted for a much shorter time.
So, as we can see: you can build strong structures that can handle a lot of weight and cold weather with bolted column connections. However, that’s not the environment in most parts of the world. What about seismic areas? Earthquakes are quite common in many places and building in seismic areas is completely its own thing. Which is exactly why we will look at a very different example next, a hotel on the Tinian Island.
Hotel & Casino, Mariana Islands
Tinian Island located in the North Pacific Ocean has lately been growing its popularity as a tourist destination. Chinese developers have seen the potential and started to invest in hotels and casinos to capture the growing market. However, the region is highly seismic, which must be kept in mind when making structural plans and choosing fitting products.
Bolted connections can be used in such areas, and depending on the seismic ductility class requirements, the connection can be designed as standard, energy-dissipating, or overdesigned. Peikko’s solutions for medium ductility requirement are especially beneficial due to the 20% savings in cross-section concrete volumes. However, bolted connections HPKM and HPM-EQ are a great choice with other requirements as well. They are reliable and safe to use as studies show. Peikko also provides design guidelines for seismic bolted column connections based on this research.
Alternatively, if you wish to have more help with the design process, Peikko’s engineer team can help you as much as needed.
After a long investigation period, the developers decided to go with Peikko’s products due to two reasons. As a high seismic zone, the Tinian Island needed a special frame moment structure and Peikko was able to provide that as well as structural consultancy. In addition, bolted connections shortened the construction period by 50% and reduced the need of expensive manpower.
Personalized solutions
Peikko’s bolted connections are versatile and suit many different purposes as they are. However, as every construction project is different and has its own difficulties, Peikko focuses on your problems and finds the solutions together with you. This way we can make them suit as broad spectrum of situations as possible – most likely yours as well.
