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 | | KEYSTONE’S THE PERFECT FIT FOR HOGWARTS | | | Keystone Lintels | | 04/12/2007 | | | Keystone Lintels is helping to preserve the film star looks of a prestigious housing development in Bushey, Hertfordshire. The refurbishment of a grade II listed building is using steel lintels to ensure the structure is robust enough to support internal changes in line with modern building regulations.
Royal Connaught Park, formerly the Royal Masonic School for Boys and the location for productions ranging from the Harry Potter films to Little Britain and early episodes of the Avengers, is being converted into luxury apartments by Comer Homes.
The façades of the grade II listed building feature decorated reconstituted stone lintels that are an integral part of the design – but they are not strong enough to cope with the changes being made to the interior of the building. To meet modern fire and acoustic standards the original wooden floors are being replaced with heavier concrete structures, so some kind of reinforcement was required to cope with the extra loading on the window openings.
The lintels could not be replaced, and the façade could not be altered by the addition of any supports that were visible from the outside, so Comer Homes turned to Keystone Lintels to find a solution.
The technical team at Keystone Lintels carried out loading studies and came up with the idea of using an SL/K rolled steel lintel turned upside down and bolted to the back of the reconstituted stone lintel. This is fitted by cutting through from the inside of the building, and the shallow lip that would normally be at the top of the steel lintel fits under the reconstituted stone beam and cannot be seen.
There are over 400 windows in the development, in a wide variety of styles and sizes, so Comer Homes is buying the lintels in 2.4, 2.7 and 3m lengths and cutting them to size on site as required for smaller windows.
Keystone Lintels is providing in-depth technical support on a continuous basis and is also advising on the specification of the standard box section lintels used in the interior of the building.
Barry Comer of Comer Homes commented, “The service from Keystone Lintels has been very good. They came up with innovative technical solutions and provided expert support.” | |
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