|
In designing its new production factory, Denmark’s Fiberline Composites has taken the opportunity to showcase some of the exciting new possibilities opened up by FRP profiles for European manufacturers of windows and facades. Examples can be seen at fensterbau frontale in Nuremburg from 2 - 5 April.
Fiberline Composites, a Danish supplier of FRP profiles to window manufacturers, has integrated tomorrow’s window and facade technology into its own production factory. The new building offers a fascinating glimpse of what the company’s composite profiles will mean for window and facade designers in the future.
Every day, tens of thousands of motorists drive past Fiberline’s new production factory situated close to the Little Belt Bridge near the town of Middelfart. What they see is an impressive, high-tech, oblong-shaped edifice rising out of the landscape. The building is pierced by three oblique glass and composite towers.
Narrow bands of windows
The building’s 300 metre-long facade works dynamically, its surface being broken by narrow bands of FRP windows that at night appear as illuminated threads.
Viewed from the motorway, the windows seem devoid of casements and frames, an effect brought about by the use of Fiberline’s slim and stylish FRP profiles.
The slender casements allow more daylight to enter and make a positive contribution to the building’s energy balance, which also benefits from the effective insulation and absence of thermal bridges that are the result of using composite.
Glass towers and cladding
Viewed from close to, it can be seen that - except for the glazing - the facade is constructed entirely of composite. The windows are enclosed by FRP cladding panels that turn the climate shield into an integrated whole. For this purpose Fiberline elected to use unpainted profiles, which accentuates the reinforcement and produces a highly distinctive architectural look. The profiles used in this application are translucent, which creates a unique lighting effect when caught by the rays of the sun.
The production factory is pierced by three huge wedges of light - the three oblique glass towers that contain meeting rooms and stairways. Large bands of roof glass run the length of the 23,000 m2 production facility, pulling daylight into the area where the GRP profiles are fabricated.
The towers consist of large expanses of glass combined with slender FRP profiles. Bonding together glass and composite unites two building components that share virtually identical longitudinal expansion. Together they constitute a load-bearing element which enables very slender facade profiles to be achieved.
For further information or photos, please contact:
Peter Kidmose Jensen, BSc. Mech. Eng.
Direct line: +41 (0) 43 233 9475
Mobile: +41 (0) 76 422 76 86
E-mail: pkj@fiberline.com
Tage Frank Jensen, BSc. Exp. Eng
Direct line: +45 76 32 77 74
Mobile: +45 25 27 76 74
E-mail: tfj@fiberline.com
|
