AC project at The Exchange in Ilford
When a company employs over a hundred engineers carrying out services in and around retail locations, showrooms, and shopping centers, all over the UK, their presence is bound to be noticed. Here at JCW, our mobile engineers front line our services and brand, so when they do a great job, our clients notice and they often then introduce us to more potential clients. Here we would like to share another example of when this happened, it all began at The Exchange Shopping Centre.
JCW are maintenance service providers for a number of national brands that operate under the roof of The Exchange Ilford, our engineer who regularly visits the premises is Billy Cormack and over time, has become a “familiar face” not only to the stores we serve, but the Shopping Centre management as well. When the time came that new air conditioning (AC) units were required for their management suite, the Centre Manager, Jim, knew he could catch our Billy as he was signing in. Like a true professional representative of JCW, Billy confirmed JCW’s installation capabilities and handed the potential client directly to our Business Development Director, Richard, who personally met the Centre Management and explained just how much work we have done for two of their anchor tenants. JCW had already demonstrated their commitment and attention to health and safety while always friendly and professional. Their tenants’ provided trusted references and subsequnetly, we were invited to tender for the New Air Conditioning Replacement Project.
The Exchange in Ilford
Located in the heart of Ilford, opposite the train station, the Exchange comprises over 90 retailers including Department store: Debenhams and major national retailers: M&S, TK Maxx, Next, H&M, New Look, Wilko, Pandora, Sports Direct, and more. It welcomes an average footfall of 217,000 on a weekly basis and houses its own team of management and support staff. In October 2017, a series of improvement phases at Exchange Ilford commenced, with the aim to ensure the centre serves its local community as well as possible. Works included internal refurbishment and decluttering, the introduction of new pause points, improved parking with new dedicated parent parking zone, new toilets and parent & baby facilities, and a large free children's play area.
The Management Suite
The Centre Management comprises 4 meeting rooms, main office and one smaller office, security office and a reception area located on level 5: roof top, next to the glass dome roof.
JCW’s Mission
In order to provide the community with a better experience and operate an energy efficient premise, our clients in the retail and leisure industries are constantly improving their standards and reinventing themselves, whether its new interior style or energy efficiency improvement projects. Part of the series of improvement phases at Exchange Ilford was an AC replacement project for the management suite.
Out with the old…
Existing AC systems in place at the management suite were old Fujitsu systems, some were running obsolete, inefficient r22 refrigerant. A system needed to be put in place that would bth improve the efficiency and comfort while being value for money. So, with JCW’s AC replacement proposal, came the new…
Our Small Works team
JCW’s small works division is a team qualified installation engineers, headed up by the National Installations Manager Mick Stevenson. Mick surveyed the site, assessed the risks and proposed a mixture of high wall and ceiling cassette options to suit the areas purpose and room size. A total of 8 replacements and 1 new install was recommended and a decision made to install the units in two phases, both completed and handed over last month.
Here’s what was installed:
Manufacturer Chosen: Daikin
Locations |
Unit(s) |
kW |
Equipment |
Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Main office |
2 |
Daikin 6kw |
Round flow ceiling cassette systems |
Replacement |
Small office |
1 |
Daikin 5kw |
Compact Ceiling Cassette system |
Replacement |
Reception area |
1 |
Daikin 12.5kw |
Round flow ceiling cassette systems |
Replacement |
Security office |
1 |
Daikin 7kw |
Round flow ceiling cassette systems |
Replacement |
New meeting room |
1 |
Daikin 5kw |
Compact Cassette system |
New installs |
Small meeting room |
1 |
Daikin 5kw |
Compact Cassette system |
Replacement |
Large meeting room |
1 |
Daikin 10kw |
Round flow ceiling cassette systems |
Replacement |
Chair room |
1 |
Daikin 5kw |
Compact Cassette system |
Replacement |
The Challenges
Moving heavy goods
The Exchange is a centrally located Shopping Centre with a heavy daily footfall. We needed to ensure that there were plenty of space around during the moving of goods, as it was imperative to the daily running of the Centre that we caused as little disruption as possible. The goods lift was used to access the Management Suite and units were manually lifted or moved via sack barrow where appropriate, to their planned locations on the flat roof walkway. The engineers were to use sack barrow and genie lift to get the indoor ceiling cassettes into the MF Plasterboard Ceiling.
Customers of the Shopping Centre
We also needed to consider the other tenants in the building. The reception is a customer facing area and had constant use, so we were mindful not to cause any disruption to others around us. Most other room installations and outdoor works were out of sight of customers, where disruptions would not affect the day to day routines
Words from our JCW Project Manager:
“Over the years We have carried out many numbers of installations at the Exchange Shopping Centre via their tenants, our Retail Clients such as Goldsmiths, Tiger Retail and more. We understand our duty to be courteous, and complete works with strict health and safety management. The staff at Ilford Exchange were very pleasant to work alongside, friendly and understanding whenever safety instructions were given. I believe we have completed this project, not only on time and on budget but also that we met all of the customers' expectations.”
Handover & Training
Full commissioning, site training, practical completion and snagging have taken place by mid-June 2018 which were followed by the full completion and handover.
A full detailed O & M (Operation and Maintenance) Manual including the commissioning programme with commissioning drawings and the Health & Safety file will be provided at the time of handover, as well as user training, in line with CIBSI (Chartered Institute of Building Services Engineers) guidelines.
Future Maintenance and Project Inclusions
The first year’s maintenance of the air conditioning system has been included within the installation cost. A complete planned preventative maintenance programme has been prepared to run alongside the defects period and standard warranty, in line with the manufacturers recommendations and our Daikin accredited installer status.
Conclusion
Working in shopping centers is second nature to JCW as we have a large portfolio of retail clients contracting our maintenance and installation services. It was most certainly a pleasure to have worked alongside the team at The Exchange in Ilford. It was clear to see that the Centre Management are passionate and committed to making the local community feel more welcome and comfortable while visiting their Centre
We are already in discussion with the Centre about their next improvement project and we look forward to continuing to provide them with our engineering services.
Testimonial
When we asked Jim, The Centre Manager about his experiences working with us he spoke very highly of our service engineer Billy while he also offered his kind words of gratitude towards the installation team.
“I’m sitting in a lovely air-conditioned office. All the guys are a credit to you. (JCW) Completed with no disruption to our day. We are extremely happy with the service and would definitely recommend JCW.”
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