Marley plumbs life into student accommodation

Marley Plumbing and Drainage has had its innovative eight-way collar boss and HDPE soil and waste products installed at the University of Plymouth’s new student accommodation, Astor House.  

Marley’s technical design team was able to develop a solution that was easier to install and used less materials, saving main contractor Lorne Stewart valuable time on site.   

The former NAAFI building, which was used by the University of Plymouth, has been demolished to make way for its new £21million student accommodation. The new building consists of 519 en-suite student bedrooms in flats of three to nine bedrooms and studio rooms, with offices, a reception, study rooms and a launderette. For a building containing hundreds of bathrooms, the need for a durable soil and waste system that could be installed easily and have a long life expectancy, was of utmost importance.

Peter Bastin, Technical Director at Lorne Stewart, selected Marley’s products and said: “With help from our Marley representative and technical department, we were able to mock up soil and waste designs for the new building before finalising what products we actually required. A value engineered approach cut down on the amount of materials required and simplified the design, ultimately saving us time on site.

“When viewing drainage designs and products, we were particularly impressed with Marley’s eight-way collar boss. This project consisted of en-suite pods, which where constructed offsite and then lifted into place.  We noticed that once installed, the space for pipe connections would become very tight and limited, so we needed a solution that give us the flexibility to manoeuvre and work.  Marley’s eight-way collar boss was ideal for this problem because it has four side and four top entries, which allow for multiple connections.”

At just 70mm above the floor slab, the eight-way collar boss is compact and unobtrusive, sitting neatly at finished floor level, whilst the efficient design prevents cross-flow by allowing multiple low level bath or shower waste pipes to be connected to the stack above floor level. What’s more, the universal orientation and hole-saw locator on the eight way collar boss enables maximum flexibility that simplifies installation, with no time consuming alterations.

A mixture of Marley’s HDPE soil and waste products, including pipes and its electrofusion couplers connections - a preferred method of on-site jointing – were also installed to provide high quality drainage that could withstand heavy usage.

Marley’s range of HDPE soil and waste products are manufactured to high standards of durability (with certification to BS EN 1519) and offer an alternative solution to cast iron. The lightweight construction of the HDPE products results in easy handling on site, which ultimately ensures a quick and clean installation. Particularly suited to commercial applications, such as Astor House, HDPE will also cope with temperature variations of -40°C to 100°C making it ideal for external and internal installations.

Peter continued: “This was the first time we have used Marley’s products on a project, however the installation went very well and with the continued support from Marley’s reps and technical department we will certainly be selecting products from the wide range again.”