XXL distribution center: Top performance in foundations and floors

Since its founding in 1979, Van Berlo has become an absolute market leader in industrial and superflat concrete floors. The expert in industrial floors also specializes in the prefabrication of foundation beams, dock and loading pit constructions, among other things. This combination in particular means that interesting savings can often be realized. Regular partner Heembouw also knows this, relying on Van Berlo's total concept for the XXL distribution center in Echt-Susteren.

At Businesspark Midden Limburg in Echt-Susteren, Heembouw is building a distribution center of over 100,000 m2 for Dokvast and P3. "We have been commissioned to make the entire foundation, consisting of precast foundation beams and piers, dock and loading pit structures, all the way down to setting the anchors," says Glenn Verhoef, commercial director at Van Berlo. "Being involved in the design process as early as 2019 with our precast foundation system has made it a favorable project for all parties."

Five weeks

"The greatest achievement we have achieved here as a team is that for a distribution center of more than 100,000 m2, we completed the complete foundation, dock structures and loading pit floors in just five weeks (!)," Verhoef emphasizes. "That can rightly be called a top performance that we delivered in the last five weeks of 2020! In total we are talking about 1,284 m¹ foundation beams, 316 piers, 82 loading docks divided into four loading pits and another 375 m¹ to collision reinforcement. In addition, we provided 755 anchors for the steel structure. In total, the time saved by prefabricating the foundation was at least seven weeks. By realizing everything in such a short time in close cooperation with the earth-moving company, we were able to clear the way very quickly for the steel builder, who was able to build the structure without interference from other disciplines."

Sample job

Van Berlo is involved with just about all divisions in this extensive project, with the exception of the Foundation Engineering branch. Verhoef: "The floors are founded on steel, because of the perfect quality of the foundation in Echt-Susteren. This spring we started realizing the floors. A monster job, considering the number of meters: 105,711 m2. That is the sum of 73,369 m2 of warehouse floors, 12,093 m2 of shipping floors, 12,427 m2 of mezzanine floors and 6,377 m2 of loading pit floors. No extremely high flatness requirements were imposed on the floors themselves; the racking leg loads of 100 KN, on the other hand, are higher than average. We also had to take into account the induction lines in the floors, but that is mainly a 'reinforcement thingy'. The reinforcement must not undulate too much to disturb the induction. Just before the 2021 construction vacation, we delivered the floors."

Circular concrete

Van Berlo is therefore involved in the extensive project in Echt-Susteren from start to finish. The flooring specialist has everything in-house when it comes to designing and realizing the total precast foundation system as well as the floor construction. "We are constantly innovating and developing our products in order to consolidate our position as market leader. A good example is the continuous research into the most perfect and sustainable concrete mix for monolithic floors. For example, we are already doing tests with recycled and circular concrete. We want to be less dependent on the concrete mortar industry in the near future and are explicitly committed to sustainable and crack-free floors," said Verhoef. "Soon even a newly developed concrete mix from our own lab will be applied. All our knowledge and experience is in that mixture. It just might be that we can start applying it on a large scale after that."