project
41
Charlotte Maxeke Nurses ’
Quarters get a steam upgrade
Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital ( formerly Johannesburg General Hospital ) is refurbishing ageing infrastructure and is opting for a more modern vertical hot water system to run on the steam it generates on site .
By
Ilana Koegelenberg
The existing hospital buildings , including its hot water system , were about 30 years old and in desperate need of an upgrade . This included the nurses ’ quarters , which received a complete makeover and looks almost brand new now .
As such , the Department of Infrastructure and Development hired Masinge Vlaming joint venture as the main contractor to take on this project . They in turn appointed Allsteam Engineering to take care of the hot water generation portion of the upgrade . Brencon Plumbing got involved in the remainder of the wet services contract .
System description The nurses ’ quarters consist of 16 floors with about 20 units on each floor . All of these units are fed from the vertical hot water system in the basement .
The existing hot water system was completely stripped out and replaced with a 2 500l hot water calorifier with a 300kW heating capacity . Because of its great heating capacity , this single tank is sufficiently sized to serve the entire building . This steam-operated vessel is capable of heating 3 000l / hour . ( The previous system included a central heating element , but this has since been disconnected .)
The Allsteam team has been involved in quite a few aspects of this ongoing refurbishment , and recently completed work in the nurses ’ quarters where they stripped out the existing steam system completely and started from scratch . They have done three blocks such as these already , focussing on finding the most efficient solution with the resources available .
This particular installation took about six weeks to complete .
They have done three blocks such as these already , focussing on finding the most efficient solution with the resources available .
Continued on page 42 >> www . plumbingafrica . co . za March 2017 Volume 23 I Number 1