Bauhaus, Den Hoorn: 100 km (!) of Mini Vibro poles and more

Because of the poor soil conditions, Van Berlo was able to apply its expertise to the fullest extent to realize the settlement-free concrete floor. No less than 100 kilometers (!) of Mini Vibro piles were installed in the ground.

Bauhaus will have a retail area of 17,500 square meters and will soon stock 120,000 products spread over fifteen departments. Van Berlo was engaged at an early stage by contractor Lowik Bouw to shed its light on the floor and foundation design, partly because of the poor soil conditions. Since its founding in 1979, Van Berlo has become an absolute market leader in industrial and super-flat concrete floors. "We can completely unburden our clients," begins account manager Frank Louwers. "From pasture to anchor bolt. Because we are often at the table from the start of a project, we can think along in the design phase. In many cases this results in a 'smarter' floor construction, saving us - and therefore our clients - time and money."

Creating support

The concrete floors in the new Bauhaus facility rest on 4,050 Mini Vibro piles. The name "mini" does not fully cover the load here, as the piles were applied in substantial lengths. Louwers: "We installed no less than 100 kilometers of Mini Vibro-piles to create sufficient bearing capacity here in the Harnaschpolder. The floors in the store are designed as a hybrid floor and based on mesh reinforcement with an addition of steel fibers. The outdoor area, on the other hand, was designed with mesh reinforcement only, to avoid steel fibers on the surface. A total of 3,550 m³ of concrete was processed and 285,000 kilograms of reinforcement applied. Bauhaus was so satisfied with the result that we were additionally allowed to also perform the outdoor area with a concrete floor instead of concrete clinkers, which was initially intended. Moreover, by using tight slope lines, water can be collected for planting. An even taut concrete floor is additionally much friendlier to the shopping carts."

Low shrinkage concrete

Van Berlo has everything in-house when it comes to designing and realizing the total floor construction. Louwers: "We continue to constantly innovate and further develop our products to perpetuate our position as market leader. For example, we have now started research with our engineers and concrete technologists into the manufacture of low-shrinkage concrete. We are also well advanced with the integration of Tekla within our engineering department. The aim is to work out all floors and structures in 3D from now on. For the floors this may not be so exciting, but for the foundation and dock structures all the more so."