A staggering 580 manual overhead closers from GEZE UK have been used in the building of Manchester Metropolitan University’s award-winning Business School and Student Hub (MMUBS), which covers 23,400msq and serves up to 5,000 students and 250 staff each week.
With such high footfall, safety and accessibility were of paramount importance, so the UK’s leading manufacturer of door and window control systems supplied a combination of TS 3000 V-ISM closers for the development’s extra-large steel fire doors, TS 3000 V BC closers for high-use circulation doors and TS 2000 NV closers for offices and toilets throughout the £75million development.
Ensuring visual consistency and an aesthetically pleasing continuity throughout the landmark building, all the closers were supplied in the same, cost effective, hard wearing, satin stainless steel finish and had matching guide rails or arm sets.
At 2.8m high, each pair of large steel fire doors provides a visually impressive and accessible entrance to communal areas, lecture theatres and auditoriums, but they also needed to help provide both acoustic and fire protection. In order to achieve this, the doors were fitted with an offset astragal, providing a highly effective seal, combined with a manual TS 3000 VBC-ISM closer, which controls the closing action for each pair of doors, ensuring they close one after the other, in the correct order so the seal works effectively.
In busy corridors, the TS 3000 V BC closer provided a neat guide rail solution with back check that can be used on both left-hand and right-hand single swing doors. Easy to adjust, service and maintain, the manual closers are approved for mounting on fire and smoke doors and feature thermo-controlled closing force size 1-4 in accordance with EN 1154.
And enabling access to the Business School’s numerous offices, meeting rooms and toilets, GEZE’s TS 2000 NV low opening force closers were chosen as a cost effective solution for timber doors.
GEZE UK’s sales director Andy Howland said: "The developers were keen to ensure a consistent look and feel throughout the Business School, using high quality products that meet the highest global standards. For GEZE's manual closers to be selected and installed throughout the development is a tremendous endorsement of the efficiency, effectiveness and aesthetic appeal of our product range.”
The stunning, jewel-shaped building, which has glazed facades that refract different colours depending on the sun and daylight, was designed by award winning sustainable architectural firm Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios and built by Sir Robert McAlpine. Constructed to the highest standards of energy efficiency and sustainable development currently achievable, MMUBS has achieved a BREEAM rating of 24/25.
Not only has the Business School achieved international recognition for its innovative architectural design and superior sustainability credentials, but it’s also been commended for its technical and building control solutions. Shortlisted in the World Architecture Festival 2012 and honoured with the Sustainability Award at The Concrete Society’s Awards for Excellence in Concrete 2012, the development was also named winner of the Large Project Category at The Institution of Structural Engineers’ North West Structural Awards 2012 and crowned best education development at the Local Authority Building Control Building Excellence Awards 2012.
