FOCUS Management process Case study – B&M, UK
ONE GOOD example of prefabrication in fire safety is B&M’s new distribution centre, which is one of the largest warehouses in the UK. Working against a short installation timeframe, Compco Fire Systems (CFS) – the UK’s largest national fire engineering provider – partnered with Victualic, a producer of mechanical pipe joining solutions, to prefabricate the build off site.
Timeline and method
A rapidly growing variety goods value retailer, B&M has stores operating in the UK, Germany and France. It has recently injected £100m in investment to create a new distribution centre in Bedford that is expected to create 1,000 new jobs. The distribution centre will become B&M’s sixth in the UK – CFS has been involved in three – and will support its southern operations. Started in April 2019, the project took just
over eight months to complete, finishing in January 2020. Every installation project faces its own challenges, but when the project is one of the largest in the UK and involves a warehouse measuring 1m square feet and 22 metres up to the apex, the challenges inevitably become amplified. To make sure that the B&M warehouse
was adequately protected, CFS was trusted to install the fire protection system. CFS was
fully aware of the fact that quality products and a trustworthy partner were essential to make the project a success. After working with Victaulic for 18 years, CFS knew that the firm possessed the necessary qualities. In the 17 weeks prior to the project’s
inception, CFS prepared drawings of the fire protection system with Victaulic products in mind, adhering to strict regulatory standards. For this project, which had a limited timeline for completion, CFS opted to prefabricate much of the fireproof system with special attention to the alarm valve modules, leading to its decision to partner with Victaulic, whose grooved, easy to install solutions lend themselves to pre modulisation. This method allows products to be
delivered when they are needed rather than all at once, which was essential for B&M’s warehouse installation as there were close to 72,000 rack heads and 54 valve sets involved. As required pieces arrived as part of prefabricated alarm valve modules, CFS was able to maintain programme on site by increasing the efficiency of the installation.
Boosting efficiency
Victaulic’s Style 009N FireLock EZ rigid coupling was an essential component to prefabrication during the installation. The product is extremely economical: its single
36 MAY 2020
www.frmjournal.com
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