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Using Innovation and Value Engineering to Offset Rising Costs
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Mechanical piped services represent a significant proportion of the total build cost in today’s modern buildings. During the design and tender stage of large construction projects, spanning one or two years how much cost can be built into the supply chain to protect against inflationary costs whilst maintaining that competitive edge? The contractor is often left to absorb these unforeseen increases and is at the mercy of the markets which are at best unpredictable! In recent times we have all felt the effects of large % increases in the cost of commodity items such as steel, copper, zinc and oil based plastics, outside of our direct control.
Increasingly, contractors have had to become innovative in their approach to manage and minimse the elements of cost that are within their own direct control. The UK piping market for Building Services, Industrial and Process systems utilises largely screwed, flanged or welded jointing but in light of escalating material and labour costs, coupled with increased concern for operator health and safety and a diminishing skills base, there is a significant uptake in the use of Grinnell’s Grooved Piping System which is now used in many major UK construction projects and offers contractors the opportunity to greatly reduce installation times and therefore recoup a significant portion of their costs when compared to traditional methods:
- Installation times of individual fittings can be 1/10th those of welding
- No hot works
- No maintenance
- Compliments off-site manufacture
- Simple to install
The speed and simplicity of the Grinnell grooved piping system provides a Safer Working Environment, eliminates the requirement for Hot Working, optimises available Labour and operator Skills and compliments other innovative jointing systems being used in smaller sizes. The benefits of a Grooved pipework system can be realised in modular prefabrication techniques as well as in on-site installations.
