Space Age Storage regularly acts on behalf of large retailing groups who operate distribution centres across the United Kingdom.
This particular project took place in Warrington Cheshire, and formed part of an efficiency based consolidation, within a well known clothing retailer.
There were substantial pressures abounding the imminent end of the retailer’s commercial lease on the property, and an overriding need to return the building to its original state, prior to being filled to capacity with storage equipment and ancillary systems.
The equipment inventory included a huge mezzanine floor, with a connected 2 tier garment hanging system, integrated overhead conveyors, pallet racking and a vast 2 tier shelving system. With 1.5 kilometres of suspended walkways and the densest possible integration of racking, the warehouse complex had been custom designed to achieve the maximum utilisation of internal volume within the building.
In all, almost 100,000 square feet of storage space racked ground to roof.
A detailed analysis was undertaken of the individual installations within the building, and a plan devised, which allowed us to create enough space to dismantle the really large equipment installations.
All of the low rise shelving and racking systems were dismantled first, packed up and removed from site. This created a substantial central space within the building in to which, materials from the mezzanine floor and 2 tier installations could be sorted, marshalled and packed, before removal from site.
All of the large equipment installations had literally miles of cabling, lighting and fire suppression systems taking the form of water pipes, sprinkler heads, sensors and light fittings together with associated suspension fittings. All of these systems were dismantled first followed by the storage equipment itself.
Piece by piece, like a giant Meccano set, the structures are systematically deconstructed with components being carefully sorted, stacked and banded ready for removal from site. This proved to be a truly ‘Goliath’ undertaking, and involved a specialised team of 8 men working solidly for 9 weeks.
In all, we removed 15 No x 44ft Articulated Lorries full of storage equipment in component form, and 20 salvage containers of waste metal and other building materials.
Planning for the project took almost 6 weeks to complete.
