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Mapei UK Ltd's Little Black Book Range is now available to download free of charge at www.mapei.co.uk.

Both Ceramic and Flooring ranges are available in easy view pdf versions, enabling a snapshot of Mapei UK's product portfolio at your fingertips.

The Ceramic Black Book contains information on the range of paste and powder adhesives, latex additives, waterproofing systems, screeds, levelling compounds, grouts, primer and sealant.

The Flooring Black Book includes information on the UK range of screeds, levelling compounds, surface membranes, primers, adhesives, sealants and tools, and includes the successful ECO Range – a portfolio of products with virtually zero emissions of Volatile Organic Compounds.

For your free glance please visit www.mapei.co.uk

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Modern building design incorporates the latest technology, combining contemporary cost-effective construction techniques with consideration of ongoing energy and operating costs. These principals apply to the whole building and the products and systems, which make up the Building services, play a vital part in the overall plan.

Every Design, Facility and Energy Manager knows that the basis of good management and control is effective measurement, to provide a picture of what's happening, feedback on actions taken, demand trends and actual consumption! And in the area of Liquid flow, heat and energy measurement a comprehensive Sub-metering system is vital to energy management of the building.

Micronics Fixed “Clamp-On” meter solutions based on non-invasive, ultrasonic technology offer a cost-effective alternative to conventional meter installation with established savings of up to 90%! They can make a significant contribution in a comprehensive sub-metering system and they are simple to service and maintain with no need for system drain downs, facilitating fast repairs and minimum down times.

They are in short a modern tool for contemporary building designs with advanced building services. And these clear benefits have been recognised by the incorporation of “Clamp-On” non-invasive meters in major developments such as London's ExCeL exhibition centre and more recently Heathrow Terminal 5 where “Clamp-On” meters form a significant part of the Terminal's sub-metering system.

So if your design requires a fixed flow or heat measurement/metering solution the “Clamp-On” alternative should be a must consider option particularly for large pipe-work installations!

Micronics offer a comprehensive range of fixed “Clamp-On” meters to cover a wide range of Building services applications. And they also offer flow measurement and analysis services, combining their product range with Flow Analysis software and expert staff to conduct flow and pump efficiency surveys.

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ATG Access has been short listed for an award at the Institute of Highways & Transportation (IHT) awards 2007. The awards which are run in conjunction with Corus and the National Security Advice Centre (NSAC) were set up to celebrate and reward the remarkable achievements of those working in highways and transportation.

ATG has been short listed in the “Security in the Public Realm” category for its work at Paradise Street bus station in Liverpool. The location of the station left a nearby building vulnerable to vehicular attack and ATG's SP1000 rising bollard system closed that gap.

The SP1000 has been crash tested as part of the production of the PAS 68 standard, various tests have been carried out, the most impressive of which saw a 7.5 tonne truck impact into a single bollard at 50mph. The truck was stopped dead and the bollard continued to function.

Rated to exceed the criteria in American standard K12, the SP1000 is a masterpiece of engineering and protects government facilities, embassies and high profile stadiums around the world from the threat of terrorist attack.

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Sentinel, the UK’s leading water treatment specialist, has highlighted that energy efficiency – and complying with Building Regulations – not only makes sense from a green perspective – reducing emissions of CO2 and reducing energy bills – it actually makes good business sense for installers from an income point of view. In fact, adopting an energy efficient approach to being an installer, is a business in itself.

Sentinel is committed to reducing the environmental impact of domestic heating systems and has commissioned independent research, carried out by GASTEC-CRE, that has shown that a poorly maintained system may experience a 2-3% reduction in boiler efficiency and up to a 15% reduction in overall system effectiveness. For the householder that isn’t funny.

Sentinel’s Sales Director for UK and Ireland John Lynch says that for many installers, using Sentinel products to clean and inhibit the heating systems they install or service can – on average – add around £100 to their income each week. That’s an additional £5,000 a year and that’s not to be sniffed at: “It’s a significant amount. It’s simple to use and it’s not a cost that will cause problems when billing a customer,” he says. “Increased awareness of the need to be energy efficient – to reduce emissions of CO2 and to address the problems associated with global warming – has made many consumers keenly aware that they can have a direct and positive impact on helping to reduce energy usage in their homes. The lower fuel bills are often the key driver, but if an installer raises the issue and gets the customer onside, the cost of chemical water treatment products is not going to be a problem for householders.”

Sentinel has launched its new Energy Efficiency Campaign with a view to hammering home the facts about water treatment in domestic heating systems, adding further credence to the benefits of doing the job properly: “We know that there are still a significant minority of people claiming to be installers out there who are cutting corners and leaving their customers with incomplete installations, and systems that will very rapidly lose the efficiency levels that new high efficiency boilers can provide,” says John Lynch. “They do the quality installers no favours at all. Cleaning a system properly, either utilising a manual flushing with Sentinel X400 or for heavily scaled and clogged systems, a jetflushing, using our heavy duty, one visit X800 cleanser, followed by proper inhibiting of the system using X100, to keep it the way, it will ensure that the boiler and the system operate at optimum efficiency levels and provide welcome reduced energy bills for the householder and a system that performs as it should, responsible for significantly less CO2 emissions than a dirty, untreated system. It’s a very simple way forward and as we’ve proved already, it can add a healthy chunk of profit to an installer who uses Sentinel products, even just 3 times a week.”

Installers simply have to go to the Sentinel web site, click on the ‘energy efficiency’ tag and sign up for a range of freebies and information. Just by signing up you will receive 10 free Sentinel Quick Test kits, a number of customer leaflets explaining the benefits of water treatment – ideal for popping in with quotes, a £10 discount voucher for the Sentinel Water Treatment Training Pack and that’s not all! You’ll receive regular energy efficiency updates from Sentinel and automatically be entered into a free prize draw for Premiership Football match tickets.

The recently launched takeaway pack for installers – the Building Regulations Compliance Pack – that includes everything an installer needs to comply with the Building Regulations in England, Wales and Scotland – X800 cleaner, X100 inhibitor and a CombiGuard unit, required by Building Regulations to address the problems of limescale in a domestic hot water system in areas of the country where hardness of the water exceeds 200ppm – will help installers to make increased profits too. The installation of a CombiGuard unit with its twelve month polyphosphate cartridge, allows installers to return every twelve months to replace the cartridge and check the status of the inhibitor in the system, helping to build the customer relationship as an on-going one from year to year.

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The appearance of ATG Access at IFSEC 2007 underlines the company's ability to provide effective security solutions and secure access control for every type of application.

Whilst maintaining its links to traditional bollard security with its latest fully accredited manual security posts the attention of visitors to the show will almost certainly be drawn to the impressive video footage showing the companies SP1000 automatic rising bollard.

Crash test footage showing one single bollard taking the impact of a 7.5 tonne truck travelling at 50 mph and stopping it dead will impress all who see it. The SP1000 was tested as part of the production of the PAS 68 standard and its test results exceed those in the American K12 standard.

Stand number 23245 will feature the answer to every level of security, from a single residential driveway right up to the anti-terrorist SP1000.

Call on stand to hear about the latest additions to the product range, a static bollard from the SP range which will sit in a shallow mount foundation of just 200 mm. This product has already been tested and performed a dead stop on a 7.5 tonne truck travelling at 30mph with zero penetration.

The company will also be releasing to market a revolutionary crash rated gate, manufactured using the latest high tech synthetic fibres and designed to offer a lightweight but very robust and secure access control solution. Both these products are masterpieces of engineering and are set to revolutionise the security industry.

For more details on this story, or any of the ATG Access product range, please contact their marketing department on 01942 685 522 or e-mail: ian.parry@atgaccess.com , visit their website at www.atgaccess.com for extensive product information or to see footage of the crash tests of the SP1000 bollard.

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The Wilo-Stratos ECO high-efficiency pump has been given an “excellent” rating by the leading German consumer’s association Stiftung Warentest. It came top in tests as the best in energy efficiency and in price/performance ratio, compared to all other small circulator heating pumps. The full results can be read in the recent issue (No. 9/2007) of the magazine “Test”.

“Stiftung Warentest“ was founded in 1964 by the German Bundestag and since then it has been undertaking the independent testing of products and services using scientific test methods in independent institutes, and it publishes the results in its magazines.

Total independence in the testing procedures, buying samples of products to be tested anonymously and ignoring advertisement claims for these products guarantee the independence of Stiftung Warentest and the results give consumers the greatest possible confidence that they can rely on the test’s quality judgements.

In the current heating pump test, the Wilo-Stratos ECO obtained the highest energy efficiency evaluation with a mark of 1.3. The tests carried out by “Stiftung Warentest” suggest that over a period of 20 years, in a typical single-family house application scenario, the product incurs electricity costs of only 238 Euros – or around £150 – just £7-50 a year. This suggests that the long-term electricity costs of the Stratos ECO are an impressive 23 per cent below the costs of the pump which made it into second place in the tests. Compared to the model that came last in the tests, Stratos Eco delivered a staggering 80 per cent saving in electricity costs.

The Wilo Stratos Eco pump also achieved an ‘excellent’ mark in the handling category – covering the operating manual, installation and commissioning, operation and maintenance.

Wilo is proud that it developed the first ‘A’ rated pump available in the marketplace and the latest Stratos Eco range comfortably achieves an ‘A’ rated status. ‘Stiftung Warentest’ also highlighted an average price for the Wilo-Stratos ECO that is lower than the prices of the main two competitor products they tested, confirming the value for money that these Wilo pumps offer.

Compared to all the small circulator heating pumps tested, the Wilo-Stratos ECO, with its purchase and operating costs of less than 600 Euros (£375) , is the most economical product over a 20 year life cycle.

Wilo recognises that the ‘Stiftung Warentest’ tests will arouse awareness in the marketplace not just in Germany but across Europe and in particular here in the UK:B “It will continue the acceleration in the Stratos Eco pump’s market penetration as people recognise the energy and cost-savings associated with the high-efficiency pump but perhaps most importantly in its CO2 reduction capability,” claims Wilo UK managing director Stuart Herritty.

The reference value table contained in “Test” is especially helpful: it compares the old energy-guzzling pumps, which see electricity costs amounting to 100 to 150 Euros per year (£60-£90 per year) in a three-person household consuming 520-800 KWh, with the new high-efficiency pumps, which add costs to an average household budget of only 11 to 29 Euros annually (£7-£18 per year) with a consumption of 60-150 KWh.

Not surprisingly, ‘Stiftung Warentest’ recommends that people do not wait until their old pump stops working to invest in the new pump generation. Wilo’s Dan Wild said: “These results confirm what we already knew to an extent, but the independent nature of these test results is a very real boost for us and the Wilo-Stratos Eco range in the UK. The dual advantages of saving electricity costs and the reductions in CO2 are highly topical here in the UK as we see energy savings and emission reductions driving everything we do in the domestic heating sector.”

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The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency has granted the building products manufacturer, Hambleside Danelaw Ltd, permission to recycle at its Inverness factory glass reinforced polyester (GRP) returned to the Group from rooflights and other products that have reached the end of their use.

The monetary value to the Group of using the grinded waste in its manufacturing processes is significantly greater than the cost of disposing it, demonstrating again that there is sound commercial sense in businesses going green.

SEPA's go-ahead for Hambleside Danelaw's take-back scheme, which has been granted under the powers of the Environmental Protection Act, is the latest in a series of environmental initiatives which has seen the Group switch its electricity supply to renewable sources, including wind power from the Isle of Gigha.

The scheme allows Hambleside to take back end-of-life products for recycling in-house. The Group has recently installed machinery to process the waste from glass reinforced plastic, making the Dalcross facility the first commercial fibreglass recycling plant in the UK.

Hambleside Danelaw is now working on developing other quality products to make from the new high strength, high quality materials that can be produced from this recycling material. These products will be available on the market in the near future.

Slashing of landfill waste to almost zero impresses Lib Dem leader

The Group has also announced that it is on track to achieve by the end of 2007 a reduction in its total landfill waste from 904 tonnes in 2001 to approximately 3 tonnes – the latter being equivalent to the waste of the average British household. This achievement should be measured against the fact that Hambleside Danelaw is manufacturing circa 1.5 million square metres of roofing materials each year.

News of the impending landmark was passed to Scottish Liberal Democrat leader, Nicol Stephen MSP, when he visited the Dalcross facility recently to see for himself the various green initiatives that have led to the Group winning numerous environmental awards.

Ray Khan, Hambleside's Quality, Safety and Environment Manager, said: “SEPA's official go-ahead for our waste take-back scheme is further recognition that business in fast-growing Inverness is leading the way in Britain in terms of combining enterprise with social and environmental responsibility. And what's more, these green initiatives can lead to increased profitability.”

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With the launch of AMTECH 2008, the market’s leading software for Electrical Contractors, Consultants and Engineers has been completely re-written. Using advanced new technology, AMTECH 2008 is compliant with the new 17th Edition Wiring Regulations due for release by the IEE in January 2008 and includes a host of powerful new features.

Some of AMTECH’s most significant changes are to FastTest and ProDesign. FastTest 2008 is not only compliant with 17th Edition but now incorporates the very latest technology, new Data Security and, due to customer demand, advanced versions are also Multi-User Network Ready.

ProDesign 2008 is also re-written to incorporate the latest 17th Edition Wiring Regulations and includes a new Drawing Interface and Updated Data Entry feature.

The eagerly anticipated launch comes after significant consultation with clients. Sales director James Cooper said: “We have been listening and reacting to our customers’ needs, and with their help we have developed the most advanced version of AMTECH to date. It is easier to use, looks more professional and will help them to stay to stay at the top of their game.”

He added: “As part of this major new release, ProDesign and FastTest have been re-written incorporating the latest technology and are compliant with the new 17th Edition Wiring Regulations. We believe AMTECH 2008 is the most advanced design and Test & Inspection software ever.”

For a full AMTECH 2008 launch guide call free on 0800 028 28 28

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Krystal Racing Space Air rider Lee Jackson rounded off the 2007 Metzeler Racetec National Superstock Championship with two top ten finishes at Brands Hatch in October.

Still recovering from a chipped ankle bone and a dislocated thumb from a smash at the Bol d’Or in September, the 2005 champion fought his way to seventh place on the Saturday and a sixth on the Sunday, giving him 111 points to end the Metzeler Racetec National Superstock Championship season in sixth-place overall.

Meanwhile, after being knocked back to 25th in Saturday’s race, team-mate Paul Veazey, who had recently recovered from his own injuries, achieved a 17th place finish, but was forced to retire from Sunday’s race with gearbox trouble.

Commenting on the Krystal Racing Space Air team’s season, Neil Afram, Managing Director of Space Air said: “Despite the team having a tough year, as principle sponsor we have been pleased that so many of our customers have been able to enjoy some exciting racing at various circuits around the country. I would like to thank team manager Tony Astle and all at Krystal Racing Space Air for their commitment throughout the year and congratulate Lee Jackson on a creditable finish in the Championship.”

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