HK1089217B - A modular building unit and a method of building using modular building units - Google Patents

Description

Standard building unit and construction method thereof

Technical Field

The present invention relates to a modular building unit for use in the construction of mainly prefabricated offices, hotels and apartment blocks and buildings of similar general character. Such modular building units are box-like structures that can be manufactured and assembled off-site and then transported to a building site for final assembly to form the interior rooms of the building. The invention also relates to a method of constructing a building using such modular building units, and in particular to the alignment (alignment) of such buildings and levelling (levelling) of the underlying or sub-floor units.

Background

It is known to construct buildings, particularly in the construction of hotels, apartments and student dormitories, using lightweight building modules, each of which is a skeletal steel shell formed of lightweight structural steel sections welded into a box-like structure and containing panels such as plasterboard, plywood or corrugated cardboard (oriented strand board) OSB. Each building module is initially formed as such a lined shell, which is then assembled to the required interior finishing standards at the factory and finally transported to the final building site for incorporation into the building. Other building modules are also known which are made primarily of wood frames and boards.

At the building site, a crane lifts the modules from the trucks or lorries transporting them and stacks them in vertical and horizontal arrangements which cooperate to form the connected rooms of the final building. For low buildings, the accuracy required for the stacking process is relatively low. Whether the individual modules are accurately positioned vertically one above the other will make little difference in the final stability of the building and it is generally considered that when the crane lowers the individual modular building units, it is sufficient to manoeuvre them by hand to their final position. For increasingly tall buildings, the accuracy of the vertical alignment of the individual building units in the array becomes increasingly important. However, the accuracy of stacking has heretofore been entirely dependent upon the skill of the crane operator in keeping the topmost building unit stationary, while it is manually manipulated by a skilled worker into the correct vertically aligned position before the tension in the crane cable is released and the building unit is placed into its final position on the underlying unit in the stack.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for automatically and accurately aligning vertically adjacent building units in a stack for such a modular building unit and building system. By making the alignment automatic and substantially independent of the skill of the construction workers handling the modular building units in place, the height of buildings constructed from such modular units by unskilled workers can be increased from a previous practical maximum of about five stories to twenty to thirty stories.

Disclosure of Invention

The present invention provides a modular building unit as described in the solution herein, the building unit comprising a lined skeletal shell to form the walls of a room, when the building units are stacked in vertical and horizontal arrangements which cooperate to form the adjoining rooms of a building, characterised in that, in order to locate precisely one module or part thereof vertically over another in the finished building, each module is provided around the periphery of its base with a downwardly extending locating flange and is further provided with an external roof cladding of load bearing plates which extend to close to but less than the top external periphery of the module and the external periphery of the module is covered with a cold-formed lightweight steel rim member, a first portion of which overlaps around the tops of the side and end walls of the module, the second portion thereof overlapping the outer edge of the panel so that the first and second portions of the edge member define a locating recess therebetween in which a locating flange of a vertically adjacent building module can be accurately located.

The cooperating locating flanges and locating recesses of vertically adjacent modules form edge locating means which enable accurate vertical location of modular building units in an array with minimal reliance on skilled labour. Preferably the locating recess has an inner side wall which is inclined upwardly and inwardly relative to the building module to guide a vertically adjacent building module into position when the module is stacked during erection of a building by stacking modules one above the other. Thus, a construction crew manually pushing the modules into position as the crane lowers the modules need only guide the lifted module to a position within about two or three centimeters of its final position, the sloping inside walls of the locating recesses being sufficient to guide the module to its exact final position. Preferably, the positioning recess is a peripheral recess, an edge recess or a positioning groove.

These building modules may be joined together horizontally and vertically as described in co-pending patent application No. W068004 and as described in co-pending patent application No. W068006, filed herewith. These modules may be formed from skeletal shells of lined architectural structural members as described and claimed in copending patent application No. W068007.

Finally, the invention also provides a method of using a levelling unit and a building module as described in the solution of the present application. Wherein one or more levelling units are positioned on a foundation or ground level structure of the building, each levelling unit comprising a skeletal shell consisting of structural steel perimeter members and cross members to form the base of a modular building unit as described above, and each levelling unit is accurately levelled and positioned relative to adjacent levelling units using shims or screw jacks between the levelling unit and the building foundation or ground level structure; and, prior to placing the individual modular building units on the levelling unit, firmly fixing the levelling unit to the building foundation or ground level structure and locating those modular building units by engaging the generally extending locating flange around the periphery of the base of each building unit in a locating recess formed around the respective levelling unit in which the locating flange of the respective modular building unit can be accurately located.

Drawings

Figure 1 is a perspective view of a modular building unit according to the present invention;

figure 2 is a cross-sectional view of a top corner of the building unit shown in figure 1, taken along the line a-a;

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view through the bottom corner of the building unit shown in FIG. 1, taken along the line B-B; and

figure 4 is a perspective view of a levelling unit for use with the modular building unit of figures 1 to 3.

Detailed Description

Figure 1 is a perspective view of a complete building module 1, the building module 1 being constructed in accordance with my co-pending patent application W068004 and also provided with edge locating means in accordance with the present invention. The module includes four walls, a bottom panel and a top panel. One end wall is shown in figure 1 as being provided with a window. The opposite end wall (not visible) will be provided with a door. The windowed wall would be located on the outside of the assembled building and the wall with the door would be on the inside, the door for example leading to a corridor through which any module in a given row can be reached.

Around the outer edge of the top of the module 1 is provided a peripheral recess as a locating recess, which is formed by a corner strip 2, as shown in figure 2. The weather strip 2 is made by folding or creasing lightweight cold-formed structural steel and comprises a front face 2a, a lower top face 2b, an inclined face 2c and an upper top face 2 d. The front face 2a is secured to the structural uprights of the modular building unit, for example by spot or plug welding. The lower top surface 2b is located above the horizontally aligned top ends of those structural uprights. Between the lower top surface 2b and the inclined surface 2c is formed the peripheral recess which extends around all four edges of the top of the module 1.

The top of the module 1 is externally covered with a load-bearing armour 3, the load-bearing armour 3 being sufficiently strong to bear the weight of those members of a construction team employed to build a building from a number of such standardised units. The top face 2d of the weather strip 2 is located in a recess formed in the top of the load-bearing apron 3 and a sound-insulating strip 4, which may be a strip of rubber or elastomer material such as high density neoprene foam, for example, is attached to the top face 2 d. Another such sound insulating strip 5 is applied to the lower top surface 2b of the weather strip 2 to provide better sound insulation between vertically adjacent stacked modules 1. An optional sound barrier, such as rubber or an elastomeric material, may be achieved by placing the weather strip 2 on a layer of sound insulating padding.

Figure 3 shows a detail of the bottom periphery of each module 1, and also shows how this bottom detail cooperates with the peripheral recess around the top edge of the module vertically below it in the final building. The module located below is shown in dashed lines in figure 3 but is the same as described above with reference to figure 2. In fig. 3, the acoustic strips 4 and 5 are shown compressed due to the weight of the module 1 vertically above, as they would in practice.

The bottom detail of the module 1 is formed by a weather strip which is cold-formed to form a downwardly extending locating flange 6 in which downwardly extending structural uprights (not shown) of the module rest. An outer wall of the flange 6 extends upwardly as an outer wall portion 7 of the bead which is secured to the outside of the skeletal building module 1, for example by spot or plug welding. The inner wall of the flange 6 is bent to conform to the angle of the inclined face 2c of the knock-out strip 2 and terminates in a floor portion 8, the floor portion 8 being welded to the bottom of a set of cross-members (not shown) supporting the floor of the module 1. Although welding is designated as the method of attachment in the particular example illustrated, other methods of attachment, such as bolts, rivets or even adhesives, are viable alternatives depending on the properties of the building being constructed and the stresses to which it is expected to be subjected.

When a building is to be constructed from a number of modules according to the invention, the lowermost array of modules 1 is first manoeuvred into position and fixed to a foundation. The modules 1 of the next floor are then lifted into position one by one with the crane. When the operator of the crane lowers the modules 1, the constructor pushes them into position. The edge location enables the modules to be accurately located on the modules of the lower floors and since the roof boarding 3 is load bearing, workers are free to walk on the roof of the underlying array of modules 1.

When each upper level module 1 is approximately in place, the crane driver lowers the module to its final few centimetres, the ramp 2c guiding it gently but accurately into alignment with the module below.

The assembled modules may be locked together as described and claimed in my co-pending patent application No. W068006. Alternatively, as a continuous cable extends from the building foundation to the roof, the continuous cable may be passed through the wall cavity formed by the aligned vertical structural posts of successive floors of the building and tensioned to lock the modules together vertically. Instead of cables, a series of interconnected pipes or rods may be used per floor in the elevation instead of cables, as described in my co-pending patent application No. W068007. Similar interconnecting pipes or rods may be used across the building in the horizontal plane, but in general it will be sufficient to connect the modules together horizontally using gutter plates straddling the seams (hives) of horizontally adjacent modules, which are typically stacked with a small horizontal gap therebetween for acoustic purposes. The gutter plate not only ties adjacent modules together, but also prevents rain water from entering between adjacent modules during construction.

Figure 4 shows a levelling unit which in effect overlies the foundation of the building or any given course (course) and is accurately levelled before the building modules of the next course are lifted into position. The levelling unit shown in figure 4 is generally indicated by reference numeral 10 and comprises a peripheral structure of C-section, each made of lightweight cold-formed structural steel. A set of C-section beams 12 extend in parallel between the C-section perimeter structures 11 forming the long sides of the base levelling unit 10, each beam being connected to a respective C-section perimeter beam 11 in exactly the same manner as the floor and ceiling beams in the building module shown in figures 1 to 3. To increase stiffness, C-section spacers (not shown) may be welded at staggered intervals between adjacent pairs of beams 12 to create a generally rigid assembly. If desired, although not shown in FIG. 4, a load-bearing flooring similar to the sheeting 3 of FIG. 2 may be used to cover the top surface thereof.

Around the outside edge of the base levelling unit 10 (although also not shown in figure 4) is a weather strip which also forms a locating recess, exactly the same as the weather strip 2 around the top of each complete building module according to the invention described and shown with reference to figure 2. Thus, figure 2 may equally be a section through one of the edges of the levelling unit 10 of those shown in figure 4, except that the straight line labelled 1 in figure 2 and representing the building module actually indicates the outer side wall of the levelling unit 10 and the C-section peripheral member 11.

In use, it is much easier to carry a levelling unit 10 than it is to carry a fully assembled building unit. Thus, after preparing the foundation of the building, one such levelling unit 10 is put in place to form the base (footprint) of each room to be formed on the successive floors of the final building. The levelling of the individual levelling units 10 can be achieved by inserting metal shims or by using screw jacks and their levelling is effected precisely until an accurate horizontal base or lower horizontal stack is produced for the individual building modules 1 of the upper stack of the final building. When each levelling unit 10 is accurately positioned and leveled, it can be fixed to the foundation or ground level structure by anchor bolts, support plates or other suitable anchoring means (not shown) so that the base stacks of the upper floors of the building are accurately levelled and fixed to the foundation or ground level structure.

The individual building modules 10 can then be lifted into position by a crane and positioned by locating recesses in the levelling unit 10, exactly as described above in relation to the accurate assembly of the upper storey of the building.

Claims (11)

1. A modular building unit comprising a skeletal shell lined to form the walls of a room, the building units when stacked in vertical and horizontal arrangements which cooperate to form the joined rooms of a building, characterised in that, in order to locate precisely vertically one module or part thereof on another in the finished building, each module is provided around the periphery of its base with a downwardly extending locating flange and is further provided with an outer roof cladding consisting of bearing plates which extend to near but not to the top outer periphery of the module and which outer periphery of the module is covered with a cold-formed lightweight steel rim member, a first portion of which overlaps around the tops of the side and end walls of the module, the second portion thereof overlapping the outer edge of the panel so that the first and second portions of the edge member define a locating recess therebetween in which a locating flange of a vertically adjacent building module can be accurately located.

2. A modular building unit according to claim 1, wherein the internal side walls of the locating recess are inclined upwardly and inwardly relative to the building modules to guide vertically adjacent building modules into position when the modules are stacked during the erection of a building by stacking modules one above the other.

3. A modular building unit according to claim 1 or claim 2, wherein the modular building unit comprises a skeletal shell of structural steel uprights and cross-members, which are lined to form the walls of a room.

4. A modular building unit according to claim 1 or claim 2, wherein the lined skeletal shell is covered with an outer roof covering of load bearing plates which extend to near but not to the outer periphery of the top of the module so that the edges of the sheeting lie along the inner edges of the locating recesses.

5. A modular building unit according to claim 1 or claim 2, wherein the locating recess is lined with a spacer of acoustic insulating material.

6. The normalization unit of claim 5, wherein said pad of sound insulation material is an elastomeric pad.

7. The standardisation unit according to claim 5, characterised in that the padding of acoustic insulation material is a rubber padding.

8. A standardisation unit according to claim 1 or 2, characterised in that the cold-formed lightweight steel edge pieces are placed on top of a layer of padding made of sound-insulating material.

9. The normalization unit of claim 8, wherein said spacer of sound insulation material is an elastomeric spacer.

10. The standardisation unit according to claim 8, characterised in that the padding of acoustic insulation material is a rubber padding.

11. A method of construction using a building unit as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 10, wherein one or more levelling units are positioned on a foundation or ground level structure of the building, each levelling unit comprising a skeletal shell consisting of structural steel peripheral members and cross-members to form the base of a standard building unit as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 10, and each levelling unit is accurately levelled and positioned relative to the adjacent levelling unit using shims or screw jacks between the levelling unit and the building foundation or ground level structure; and, prior to placing the individual modular building units on the levelling unit, firmly fixing the levelling unit to the building foundation or ground level structure and locating those modular building units by engaging the generally extending locating flange around the periphery of the base of each building unit in a locating recess formed around the respective levelling unit in which the locating flange of the respective modular building unit can be accurately located.