Once in a year takes place competition where all Estonian buildings made of concrete compete with each other – thirteen entries vied for this year’s award. The competition was open to concrete buildings and structures and processes used within such buildings delivered to customers in 2014. The jury comprised representatives from associations in the Estonian construction sector and Finnish architect Maritta Koivisto from “Betoni” magazine. E-Betoonelement won the concrete award for the Ice Hall “Tondiraba” concrete elements.
The Tondiraba Ice Arena is full of extraordinary solutions, from the 4,500 reinforced concrete elements, 2,000 m² seamless concrete floor to the imposing 62-metre span wooden girders. A total of 9,400 m³ of concrete was used.
Comment from the jury:
“Aesthetically pleasing, structurally complex sports arena with multifunctional applications that stands out among Nordic ice arenas for its greater emphasis on design.”
Aadu Kana, Chairman of the Jury:
“We were pleased to see versatile use of concrete and the excellent quality of concrete work. The marriage of concrete and timber is especially successful in this building.”
Tondiraba Ice Hall project was completed in 14 months from start to finish. Element delivery was executed in months and gave good loading for all three Estonian factories: Harku, Tamsalu and Rakvere. Several innovations were implemented during element casting. E-Betoonelement responsibility was also design of precast element working drawings which was executed by using Tekla. Total amount of produced elements was 2,913 and project value 1,9 m€.
Ülo Kaldam, production manager of E-Betoonelement’s Tamsalu factory:
“Tondiraba Ice Hall was in his tight production schedule and complex elements and finishes a serious challenge. Wood pattern columns were never before cast in our factory at Tamsalu. For better lasting of moulds we used sauna varnish from Finland, so we could use moulds 6-8 times instead of 3-4. This solution also saved time for finisher’s. Moulds, which were made of conifer, coated with varnish which made resin solid and it no longer flowed; it also glued stick wood knots, so it was much less to clean in finishing part. The most time took planning and constructing moulds for casting tribune beams. Ice hall was assembled in stages; therefore we did not cast elements in complete batches. Modifying and installation of new moulds was everyday life.”
Ivar Maran, production manager of Rakvere plant:
“It was a very interesting project – our design, our manufacturing .We figured out a new solution for the window frame moulds, moulds were made of plastic. Totally there were more than 250 wall elements with windows, each containing up to 10 differently located windows. The volumes of the walls were over 5,000 m² plus columns, beams, tribune elements, hollow cores and stairs“.
