Sandstone Cladding Fixing Systems from Stoneclip

Stoneclip.com was invited to supply the fixing medium for the cladding of the 50 mm thick Sandstone cladding panels ( 750 mm x900 mm x50 mm thick =87 kgs/panel) to be erected onto the façade of the Stamford Properties new building being built by St Hilliers Construction in the Rocks area of Sydney.

The cladding company is Stone-Tech Pty Ltd and they undertook the testing, which was overseen by Mr Thomas Yang (engineer) of the Sydney branch of Aurecom on behalf of the owners. The tests of the stone panels (Guinea Gold) and the StoneSub substructure cladding system took place at Stone - Tech's depot in Northmead on 30/6/10 and were carried out by Mr Campbell Scott (Stone-Tech)and witnessed by the engineer, Mr Bruce Kane and Mr Daniel Pribadi of St Hilliers and Mr John Redhead of Stoneclip.com.

The tests took place over 5 consecutive loadings to the ultimate test of 7 of the slabs being loaded onto the StoneSub brackets which were supporting the Sandstone panels. Each of the test loads took 30 minutes to complete.

The test results at the end supplied by Mr Yang ( engineer ) rated the fixing system as having a wind load rating of 4.5 KPa which is really high, our old Unit-Strut system was rated at 2.92 KPa. This new high result of the wind load and dead load capability is because of our new channel nut which is very unique in its design. At the finishing point the fixing system did not fail - the stone panels failed as shown in the 2nd photo when the 8th slab was being loaded on. The cladding on the building starts on the first week of August 2010