Affordable living space is scarce in Berlin, so Paragon Apartments, a contemporary inner-city housing complex in the Pankow district, is helping to ease the problem with the restoration of a former hospital, with Schöck providing the solution for potential thermal bridging problems.
The project centres on the historic and now disused Prenzlauer Berg Hospital. Two new upper storeys have been added to the original building, three further existing buildings modified and two new structures added. All are designed as a three-dimensional façade, with terraces and a shifting stacked balcony pattern involving glazed prefabricated concrete elements.
The building envelope and balcony construction is complex and to minimise potential thermal bridging problems, Schöck has supplied three Isokorb types. First the Isokorb KXT, for concrete-to-concrete. Its low ??thermal bridge construction?? certificate from the Darmstadt Passivhaus Institute, confirming its suitability even for passivhaus construction.
With the balcony design, the plate and the canopy element below act structurally on the same floor. So the two free-cantilevered reinforced concrete plates are connected by alternating the standard Schöck Isokorb type KXT that has straight shear and tension rods, with the Isokorb type KXT-HV. This has off-centre shear and tension rods on one side to enable connection to a downstand beam, where the balcony is lower than the floor slab. Both units meet the most demanding specifications and transfer negative moments and positive shear forces. In addition to the type KXT, the Isokorb types EXT and KS are also incorported. The EXT normally complements the type KXT in bearing high loads involving cantilevered external corner balconies, but on this occasion supports the side wall loads. The KS is installed where there is a requirement for the free cantilevered steel girder canopy elements to be secured to the reinforced concrete slab.
The Paragon Apartments project provides an interesting example of how, by designing-in a combination of Schöck Isokorb types, a variety of differing project specification challenges can be met.
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