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MT32 makes the connection for prestigious Highbury Studios development >
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‘Speed and flexibility’ is primarily why Looks Construction selected Marshall-Tufflex’s MT32 high speed underfloor prefabricated wiring system for the fast-track fit-out of units at Highbury Studios, a prestigious new mixed use residential and commercial development in North London offering flexible workspace, office, retail, restaurant and D1 space. This project forms part of the regeneration of Islington that included the Emirates Stadium and conversion of Highbury Stadium, the previous home to Arsenal FC, into the residential development now called Highbury Square.
Looks Construction of Dartford, Kent, has been contracted by Stadium Investement Ltd to carry out the building, mechanical and ongoing electrical fit-outs of the ground level units that range from 500–18,000 square feet, as they become rented to businesses and retailers and must be quickly transformed into offices or shops.
Each unit is bespoke and finished to the tenant’s specification. Modifications to internal layouts and power supplies are therefore needed to ensure that each one meets the differing requirements of the incoming tenant. Often this work is fine-tuned by Looks Construction as the tenant moves in, with the final positioning of desks, computers and lighting, for example.
Looks Construction established the need for a plug and play prefabricated wiring system to provide the essential speed and flexibility needed when installing power and lighting services to tight deadlines at Highbury Studios. As a result, the company explored the product options currently available.
“We researched the marketplace and found that alternative products did not offer the same level of flexibility as MT32 and other companies were not as good on lead times,” said Paul Jordan, of Looks Construction. “We therefore selected Marshall-Tufflex’s MT32 with the product supplied by Edmundson Electrical, Gravesend.”
MT32 is supplied as a total underfloor system taking complete cabling runs via a 32Amp plug and play connector to final outlets in pre-wired, pre-tested accessory boxes with male and female connectors, thereby eliminating hard wiring on-site, saving time and reducing costs. MT32 is a modular system, ideal for installations where power is fed from a main source and delivered over a wide area to a large number of outlets. Due to the flexibility of its design, it can accommodate up to three times the coverage of existing power track options and is also easily reconfigured where re-positioning of sockets is a possibility.
“The flexible conduit system to the accessory boxes is supplied to us in 3-5 metre lengths so that we only need to lift a small area of surrounding floor tiles in order to fit the boxes into the floor void,” added Mr Jordan.
“The boxes are all pre-wired and ready for plug and play connection to master circuit boards. We generally use ten circuits and 30-40 floor boxes with both ring and radial circuit cabling in the fit-out of a standard shell and core unit. With a fast turn around needed in every case, quick lead-in times were essential to us, as was speed of installation and flexibility. MT32 has delivered on all counts: it is fast to install, extremely flexible and it works very well,” he concluded.
The Highbury Studios scheme, part of the Highbury Islington Regeneration Project, is located just off the Holloway Road and has mixed residential and commercial space to great effect, with homes, shops, offices, restaurants, a supermarket, gym and studios for local artisans. The development also includes the new Emirates Stadium and Highbury Square and has been hailed as the ‘future of mixed use developments’.
