National grid

Let's hope C J Bartley isn't a superstitious firm. I say that because the company has been working at the Royal National Theatre on London's South Bank for quite a while now and, touch wood, the work will continue.

Foreman Danny Wilson was sent to the Royal National to do a small job four years ago and he hasn't left the theatre since. The initial work blossomed into what some would call a maintenance contract, only it isn't. Each job that has arisen has been a separate contract that the company has bid for and won. Luck doesn't come into it.

C J Bartley has completed – or is carrying out – all kinds of work at the theatre, from installing lighting and air conditioning in the three-storey props rooms, to replacement of the motors that drive the raisable, spinning circular stage in the Olivier auditorium.

One of these projects, the largest to date, is the upgrading of the mains distribution and switchgear to the entire theatre complex.

C J Bartley's instructions were to replace all old and redundant switchgear to provide a better distribution system, giving greater flexibility for maintenance and to provide back up should any part of the installation fail.

This sounds like a complicated project to execute. Well, add into the mix the fact that the Royal National insisted on staying open throughout the works and putting on a full schedule of performances. In fact, written into the contract was a penalty clause of £30 000 for causing the cancellation of any performance.

C J Bartley had its work cut out. The four 1 MW transformers, fed from the electricity board network have been reconfigured to run in parallel to allow any part of the installation to be fed via differing transformers, as necessary. The switchgear has had to be completely replaced with Moeller control panels incorporating acbs and mccbs. New sub mains cables up to the 300 mm parallel supplies have been installed. Redundant distribution boards have had to be stripped out and replaced with over 40 boards and dimming equipment. Masses of cables had to be re-routed and jointed using Birkett joints, which took over two hours each. Then there was the builders works and asbestos removal.

And remember, £30 000 penalty for stopping a performance, of which there could be up to eight each day. Even disregarding the theatrics going on above their heads, C J Bartley couldn't shut down the power because part of the Thames-side complex is below the water table – turn the power off for half an hour and the basement floods.

The company carried out as much work as possible around the working thespians. Elements of the project that required power shut downs had to be completed after the final Saturday evening performance and before Monday morning. Wilson and his gang had about 30 hours to carry out installation works at the weekend – 15 weekends in fact.

The project has been an exercise in planning and execution to tight deadlines. And it has worked well, think md Simon Bartley and Wilson, because they are working directly for the client. "The client was as interested as we were in getting things done correctly and on time. It went out of its way to remove obstacles for us. The job would have been a lot harder if we were working under a main contractor," says Bartley.

The mains replacement was valued at £700 000 to C J Bartley. Total works carried out to date top £1.5 million – some little job, that is. Break a leg.