MiTek 3D creates new opportunities

n exciting expansion project at a luxury golf course and popular wedding venue in Lincolnshire is coming on apace – thanks in no small part to MiTek and its groundbreaking software.

Once complete, guests will be able to enjoy a luxury spa experience, with champagne bar, gym and treatment facilities.

It’s a complex project, but with the help of MiTek’s 3D software and products from its Posi-Joist and Posi-Rafter ranges, it’s being turned into reality, and is on schedule for launch to the public in Spring 2022.

As Phil Daniels, MD of component manufacturer DWB Timber Engineering, explained: “Using MiTek and the company’s comprehensive software packages has enabled the team to navigate a complicated steel frame build, deliver savings on materials, and reduce on-site construction time.”

According to MiTek’s Anthony Mitchell, Development Manager, the design was tricky. “Getting all the elements of roof angles, the outside profiles of the steels, ensuring the correct bearings and that the three points of bounds are correct was never going to be easy.

“On parts of the build there are different steel sizes for the same bearing points. 3D meant the team could prove the concept and pare back the design to make it very buildable.”

MiTek’s 3D software enables designers, architects, and engineers to look at the design in 3D and manipulate it to see how it sits and how it fits. “You can move it around, rotate it, spin it, select an item or area, move it in, move left, move it right, move it up, move it down, make sure it’s in the right place before you go back to the layout and replicate that for everything else that you need,” said Phil.

“Without the 3Ds and the details for the ends, the joiner would have found it pretty difficult because he would have been looking at just section drawings, but you can literally paint a picture in 3D and take screenshots of it, send it to him. He rings me up, asks me a question, and I’ll look at the 3D, take a screehot and send it him back so he can see exactly what’s going on in that point, and then it’s just the discussion of a fixing.”

He added: “The structural engineer had originally specified solid timber joists for the project. But this involves a lot of labour and time, neither of which they had. By using Posi-Joist and Posi-Rafter, we’ve saved weeks on site.

“We installed both the floor and roof in just a few days, whereas with solid timber you’d have been looking at five weeks, in addition to the added labour costs of four people.”

The project is now a third of the way up and it’s taken the best part of three months, offering unprecedented time savings.

Once complete, the new development will provide ancillary facilities to the 55 golfing holiday lodges that have previously been approved at Laceby Manor Golf Course, 22 of which have so far been installed.

Roger Burnett, the owner of Laceby Manor, has made it clear he wants the highest quality building, with the end-result an exceptional experience for his customers. And everyone agrees that it’s going to be a spectacular building when it’s finished.

More at  www.mitek.co.uk