Solution

Building a condominium from scratch requires a detailed approach. Designing and building a condominium to occupy a heritage building shell from an iconic 1920's theatre is especially challenging. Only the most subtle of changes were permitted be made to the exterior of this landmark building. Even large holes in the roof were off limits.

VersaPile worked with Wood PLC (Geotechnical) and SMP Services (Pile Engineer) to come up with a pile robust enough to:
● Handle the column strength requirements for the loads● Penetrate the till● Provide enough surface area to the soil to adequately distribute the load
Crosier Kilgour & Partners (CKP) offered structural engineering services for Concord Projects and used the feedback from Wood PLC and VersaPile to design 3 and 4 pile groups to allow 4-1/2" shaft helical piles with 16" Ø bearing blades to be installed to refusal on glacial till. For each pile torque and depth was documented.

The depth to firm till varied between 33' and 40' from grade in the portion of the building to be piled with the 4-1/2" Ø shaft piles. The main construction access point was a 9'x10' opening in the brick work between masonry columns. Our 30-ton excavator needed to install 117 of the largest piles would barely fit through the opening.

Piling activity resembled a dance, as a skid steer loaded piles for the larger excavators while also staying clear of excavated pits. Overburden was rife with construction debris and unmarked building structures, which created problems with placement accuracy. VersaPile coordinated with the team at Concord to work through with CKP (EOR).
Larger piles were installed to a torque of 20.4 kip-ft [27.6 kN-m] to confirm that the helical had installed into the dense till. The process was observed by a Wood representative who verified site observations against the torque logs.

Unfortunately, our large excavators were too heavy to drive over the 1920's era concrete vestibule floor. Four (4) of the piles required the crowd of these machines for the design loads, but there was no access. VersaPile drove our 30T excavator to the edge of the floor and reached over to install piles through 12" Ø holes pre-cut in the vestibule floor.

The piles planned to go under the original vestibule of the heritage theatre presented a different problem.
Access was limited to a single elevator shaft opening. VersaPile worked with the project engineers to devise a pile solution that would work in the limited access environment. The solution was to bring in a Mr. Boomtruck-supplied spider crane and operator to lower a Kubota U-17 into the basement through the elevator shaft. VersaPile crews could then install these piles to 7.4 kip-ft (11.4 kN-m).