Andrew Schofield has won the CIOB’s 2004 Innovation Competition with his masonry roof overhang RoofBLOCK, (main picture), which solves problems presented by traditional timber overhangs.
Schofield, a civil engineer, said traditional timber roof overhangs require both carpenters and bricklayers to install them. Second, supporting timbers are often wrongly installed, reducing the overhang’s resistance to wind uplift. Third, fire-sealing the top of the cavity was difficult and sometimes overlooked.
So he developed a masonry overhang. His first attempt was a hollow box overhang with a flat slab to counterbalance it, which capped the cavity wall. On the strength of this he won an award from the DTI to fund further R&D. In collaboration with Queens University Belfast he came up with a counterbalance that hung down into the cavity. This allows for differential movement between the inner and outer walls and has a gap behind it for insulation to stop cold bridging.
Northern Irish firm CE Stevenson & Sons started making the reconstituted stone blocks for him in 2000 and Schofield reckons it has been installed on 1,000 properties. Now he is looking for a manufacturer in England.
Also say hello to the ‘Cillscaff’, a balcony scaffold dreamed up and patented by joiner-turned-professor Bernard Blain FCIOB. This baby takes one operative 20 minutes to assemble from within the safety of the room, eliminating the need for ground-up scaffolding.
Email CM for more information.
Source
Construction Manager
Postscript
See www.roofblock.co.uk for further details
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