Sir Frederick Gibberd College
SFG is home to around 800 students and made headlines for all the wrong reasons in recent years. Structural issues forced the school to close in August 2023 after completion in 2021 and pupils had no option but to be home-schooled or work in temporary tents on-site. The contractor concerned subsequently went into administration.
The DFE stepped in and pledged to resolve the issue to prevent any further disruption to pupils. A Portakabin plan was hatched up and our client, MSE, were appointed to complete the infrastructure amendments from the existing incoming services to new school blocks.
We ensured coordination across mechanical and electrical services and provided a record information on competition.
Project Details
Location Harlow
Service Type Site Survey, RIBA Stage 1-3, RIBA Stage 4-6
Project Type Education
Sector DFE
Electrical Design
Cable sizes were designed from existing submain to serve Food Technology, Science and Staff Office areas. We were heavily involved with the wider design team to ascertain what would be housed within the blocks and ensure sufficient power was provided, whilst remaining mindful of future phases of the project.
Site wide load calculations were carried out and we proved the suitability of existing sub-station, negating the need for costly network upgrades.
In addition to mains cabling, we also designed the external lighting for the site with consideration to bats.
Public Health Design
Positioned strategically allowing for known future phases, we designed a suitable mains cold water booster set and storage tank, calculating accurate usage for the site.
As well as this, we specified local booster sets fed from the main booster of a CAT-5 type for the Science block.
Phase 2
In Phase 2, we continued where we left off and our client achieved a snag-free handover in September 2024.
The successful completion of this development meant the students can resume a normal education.