Lakhta Center: Technological Aspects of the Construction of the Reinforced Concrete Structures of the Tower Box Foundation

The article deals with the main technological challenges faced by engineers and builders in the construction process of the box foundation of Lakhta Center tower building, as well as their solutions and actual implementation.

The box foundation is a complex reinforced concrete structure consisting of a bottom slab 3.6 m thick, ten radial walls 2.5 m thick, a middle slab 0.4 m thick and a top slab 2 m thick arranged as a pentagon in plan with a side length of about 58 meters. The footing of the box foundation is 264 bored piles.

The box foundation itself was constructed in several stages – from the bottom slab to the top one. Box foundation section is shown in Fig. 1.

 

Bottom slab of box foundation

The bottom slab is a solid reinforced concrete structure with a thickness of 3.6 m, a volume of about 20 thousand cubic meters. It directly transfers loads from the tower to the pile footing.

The slab is reinforced with 15 horizontal grids each made of reinforcing bars with a diameter of 32 mm spaced at 150 mm. The reinforcement had to be done in such a way so that all the bars in the grids were precisely above each other, while maintaining their positions in the process of concrete pouring. This was achieved using transverse reinforcement bars with a diameter of 36 mm simultaneously acting as a support frame for all the 15 grids. 

Separate reinforcing bars were fed into the pit using tower cranes to form the grids, and then they were manually fastened together along the length with special threaded union fittings. Bar ends were preliminarily threaded for this purpose.

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Миллер Алексей Борисович, Председатель Правления ПАО «Газпром»
Илюхина Елена Анатольевна, Генеральный директор АО «Газпромнефть Восточно-Европейские проекты»
Никифоров Сергей Владимирович, Главный инженер АО «Газпромнефть Восточно-Европейские проекты»
Нестеров Евгений Сергеевич, Ведущий инженер АО «Газпромнефть Восточно-Европейские проекты»
Смирнов Сергей Владимирович, Начальник управления по подготовке и контролю строительства АО «Газпромнефть Восточно-Европейские проекты»
Лахман Сергей Ильич, Генеральный директор ЗАО «ГОРПРОЕКТ»
Травуш Владимир Ильич, Главный конструктор ЗАО «ГОРПРОЕКТ»
Шахворостов Алексей Иванович, Генеральный директор «Инфорспроект»
Материалы предоставлены АО «Газпромнефть Восточно-Европейские проекты», ЗАО «ГОРПРОЕКТ»