RETROFITTING OF BUILDING IN PUERTA DEL SOL 1 IN MADRID

The building object of this remodelling and retrofitting project, dating back from 1860 and located at nº 1 of Madrid’s Puerta del Sol, occupies a plot of 960 m2 and consists of a basement, a ground floor and six floors above ground.

Its adaptation to commercial use, together with the limitations imposed by Patrimonio -being the building of Cultural Interest- has led to a series of structural interventions of a certain complexity, among which the following stand out:

• Reduction of the columns number, at ground floor, which has required the reinforcement, by means of micropiles, of the foundation and of the basement masonry piers that were previously drilled vertically by diamond core bit (rotation only).
• Reinforcement of masonry piers footings in alternative stripes.
• Reconstruction of the deteriorated vaults, respecting the geometry, the original construction methods and the type of brick.
• Rehabilitation of the granite façade piers: regularization cuts by diamond saw, reconstruction of deteriorated areas, cleaning and injection of clearances, etcetera.
• Replacement of ornamental cast-iron columns by cylindrical shafts in structural steel, hidden in the interior of new nodular cast iron jacketing reproducing the original appearance
• Slabs provisional prop and execution of more than 100 load transfer operations, using hydraulic jacks, to:
  • Cast-iron columns substitution;
  • Reconstruction of steel beams of great depth, executed during a previous remodelling phase of the building, to increase the free heights.
• Modification of the column layout in the higher levels.