Land and Water Services Ltd’s intimate knowledge of the waterways around East London and particularly the Olympics were instrumental in their award of the contract from BMW for the installation of the piled foundations for their showroom situated over the Waterworks River in the Olympic Park.

Access via the Olympic Park was severely restricted and the bridge heights over the river also restricted the size of plant that could be brought to site via the river. Land & Water Services solution and their water-borne plant meant that no material or plant access was needed through the Olympic Park.

The project required 22nr tubular piles, 559mm dia to be driven to a depth of 12-14m below river bed level. The piles were then capped and beams and knee braces fixed ready to receive the steel work for the new showroom building. Overall length of the tubes was in the region of 16m so Land & Water Services elected to have them delivered to site in two pieces and used their own Ravestein pontoon mounted with hiab crane to drive them into the ground. Section one was driven to water level with a vibrating hammer with the second section being welded to complete the pile. The tube was then driven to final level or set with an 8t hydraulic drop hammer. The piles were trimmed with beams and braces fitted within a 5mm tolerance.

Vibration monitoring equipment was fitted to a nearby major UK Power Networks cable prior to the works commencing. At no time were the monitors triggered by our works. Land & Water Services concluded this successful contract for BMW as Principal Contractor.

Construction of Mooring Platform for Cawood Barge.

The remit for this contract was to install a steel mooring platform for the Environment Agencies Cawood Barge which is used for rock placing on the River Welland and out into the Wash. The contract required working in tidal conditions and involved removal of birdcage scaffold from around existing pre driven case piles, the installation of a new temporary working platform, the removal of accumulated silt, cutting down of case piles, fitting of new steel pile caps and the installation of steelwork/bracings.

The existing case piles had been driven two years previously by the Environment Agency so the first job was to survey the verticality of the piles and to plot positions to allow the pile caps to be made individually to correct any discrepancies in the piling. A 35t long reach machine was then mobilised to site to remove the accumulated silt between the piles to get down to the working platform level. This section of works was conducted in partnership with the scaffold company who removed the old birdcage and installed the new platform.

The contract was carried out in tidal conditions with very small working windows and was completed to programme and undertaken under full construction design & management regulations with Land & Water Services as Principal Contractor.

Land & Water Services were contracted by Carillion to construct an Impoundment Dam to create Lagoon A which forms part of the Rutland Water Habitats Creation Scheme.

The works consisted of  the installation of 260 linear meters of AU16 sheet piles together with the placement of 8000 tonnes of rock armour to form a bund. The piling, which comprised pairs of piles between 3.2m and 8m in length, was carried out using an excavator mounted Movax 75 Side Grip Piler working off a 15 piece Spud Leg Unifloat Pontoon.

The Movax sheet piler is a high frequency hydraulic vibrator  which is controlled by a cab-mounted computer allowing the operator to select a precise angle to drive/extract the piles. The Movax sheet piler automatically corrects the straightness of the sheet pile during the driving and extracting and the side grip allows the piles to be picked up, positioned and driven in one fluid motion.

Due to exceptionally high levels within Rutland Water at the time of the works it was also necessary to cut many of the piles underwater using a dive team.

The subsequent Armour Stone placement was carried out from the same pontoon using a grab mounted on a excavator with the material being transported using a 6 piece Unifloat Pontoon.