Category: Re-strengthening and Seismic Upgrades

Wallace Building Contractors have completed a range of Re‑strengthening and Seismic Upgrades to buildings around Wellington for the past 20 years. Including heritage listed buildings, private dwellings and strengthening of large commercial high rises. From this previous history of working on seismic upgrades and refurbishment of buildings Wallace Building Contractors has developed specialised procedures and methodologies to complete the unique Wellington seismic upgrade projects. WBC has worked on a number of Category 1 and 2 Historic buildings and understands the unique requirements of these projects.

2019 – Completed

2019 Completed

2015 – Wallace Building Contractors was contracted by Naylor Love to undertake the Concrete, Reinforcing and Comflor Installation to the Hutt City Council’s administration building in Laings Road which undertook a major seismic strengthening refurbishment and extension.

The building was extended with a new 4 story Annex constructed on the side of the existing building clad in glass and featuring a full height atrium. The Existing building had all foundations replaced with large foundation beams on piles with seismic upgrading of the exterior walls. All existing concrete floors were removed and replaced with a Comflor 80 flooring system with through deck welding installed by Wallace Buildings specialist company Wellington Stud Welding.

2014 – Wallace Building Contractors was contracted by Hawkins to undertake the concrete and reinforcing to the seismic upgrade of Colonial House in Lower Hutt. New 300m3 foundation pads are being formed to replace the existing foundations with new steel K-Frames between the existing insitu concrete columns. 450mm deep Insitu concrete collector beams were installed throughout the upper levels of the building with H40 reinforcing bars to tie it all together.

2014 – Wallace Building Contractors was contracted by LT McGuinness to install Comflor 210 to the Level 7 Podium of the PWC Building. Huge structural steel braces have been installed under the existing interspan floor system which is being removed and replaced with a Comflor 210 concrete floor system. Over two thousand 200mm long shear studs were site welded by WBC onto the beams after the Comflor was installed. All work is took place in a live working carpark building with minimal disruption to the PWC building tenants.

2014 – Wallace completed the concrete, renforcing and fitout for Naylor Love for this major seismic upgrade of this building opposite the Embassy Theatre. New concrete foundations, columns and shearwalls were built for Structural Steel K-Braces to be installed for the next 3 floors with new insitu concrete floor slab infills to bring this building closer to the current earthquake code.

2013 – Wallace was asked by Arrow International to undertake the seismic upgrade of Cumberland House at 235 Willis St due to our previous experience with strengthening works and resources available in a very tight timeframe. The student accommodation building seismic strengthening involves two sprayed concrete Shearwalls 5 floors high the full width of the building, self-compacting concrete spandrels and upgrades to the existing columns and floors. The seismic upgrade of the building was not originally planned when the building’s interior was due to be refurbished over the Students summer break due to the impending sale to overseas owners and Wallace had to commit to having the strengthening work completed by the first week of February. Work started in December 2012 one week behind schedule and Wallace worked all through Christmas with a large crew of staff and subcontractors and finished the strengthening works Three weeks ahead of schedule on the 16th of January 2013. Arrow has expressed their gratitude at the hard work and professionalism that Wallace showed to allow them to complete the buildings refurbishment on time.

This existing carpark building was seismically upgraded in 2003 to allow the construction of 5 stories of apartments to be built on the top of the carpark. Wallace was involved in the construction of new 300mm thick Shearwalls built between existing concrete columns, Insitu concrete walls poured against existing concrete walls with scabbled and epoxied starters. Concrete columns and foundations were strengthened and a new 8m long shearwall was built 2 floors high on the top of the carpark for the new steel and timber apartment structure. All of this work was undertaken without the closure of the carpark.

This building involved an extension to the YHA youth hostel into the adjoining brick building. The original Brick façade was retained and strengthened with insitu and sprayed concrete and a new 5 story concrete structure was built behind the façade. All work was undertaken without disruption to the existing YHA building.

Wallace was involved with Arrow International in the construction of the new surgical block at Wakefield Hospital. The work involved a new 3 story structure with strengthening and alterations to the existing Wakefield Hospital main block. Insitu and sprayed concrete was used to strengthen the existing structure to bring it up to the standard of the new additions. All work was completed with minimal disruption to this busy private hospital

This building was re-strengthened and upgraded in 2002. The building was converted intotwo full floor apartments with a new penthouse constructed on the top floor. The work involved concrete underpinning and new foundation walls to create new large garages. The structure of the building was seismically upgraded and a new concrete structure was built to extend the building to the rear and increase the footplate for the new penthouse.

Originally built in 1908 this distinctive brick facade was retained and strengthened with reinforced concrete while a new 8-story apartment complex built behind the faade. The apartment structure was built with new concrete Shearwalls and 8 floors of Hibond concrete floors with floorplates of over 1000m2

The State Insurance building is one of Wellington’s most distinctive and distinguished pieces of architecture marking the beginning of modernism in Wellington. It was a state of the art building for the time, not just for its high standard of architectural design, but for its structural design, however after 60 years and the sale of the building to new owners the building was re-strengthened in 1998 and a 3 story addition designed by Athfeild Architects. Wallace formed 3 sets of insitu concrete Shearwalls up the existing lift shafts for the 8 stories of existing building. Thousands of reinforcing starters were drilled and epoxied into the original concrete lift shaft walls and the floors were cut out and stitched into the new Shearwalls creating a new structure transferring load from the building extension down to the basement and upgraded foundations

Unicom Building – Willis St New shearwalls and strengthening of a 6-story building on Willis St

KBL Building – Courtney Place New Concrete shearwalls and new concrete floors to the old McDonalds Building on Courtney Place