ZÜBLIN starts timber construction work at Martin-Behaim-Gymnasium

The new Martin-Behaim-Gymnasium building has reached an important milestone: following completion of the reinforced concrete construction work, timber construction began at the end of February. This means that the building is now growing in height. The new educational campus is one of the largest new school construction projects in Germany. The new building offers a modern and sustainable learning environment for around 1,700 pupils.

The school building, including sports hall and canteen, has a gross floor area of around 30,000 m² and is being built using modern timber construction methods. The roof and façade work as well as the structural timber construction and steel work for the new building are being carried out on behalf of WBG KOMMUNAL GmbH by the ZÜBLIN Bavaria Directorate together with the timber construction specialist ZÜBLIN Timber.

A total of around 7,000 m³ of timber is being used. The timber modules used include LENO^® cross-laminated timber, glulam and BauBuche. The load-bearing structure consists of solid glulam supports and beams as well as laminated beech veneer lumber in areas subject to high loads. The façade of the Martin-Behaim-Gymnasium is designed as a timber frame construction with timber lamella formwork over an area of around 6,000 m². The project thus sets a strong example not only architecturally, but also in terms of sustainability. The timber elements are precisely pre-produced at the ZÜBLIN Timber plant in Aichach, which significantly shortens the construction time.

"With the exception of the stair towers, the building above the basement ceiling is being constructed entirely in timber. The central feature of the individual construction is the deliberate omission of a timber-concrete composite ceiling. This requires innovative detailed structural and fire protection solutions, as many timber components remain visible and do not have any additional fire protection cladding," explains Michael Weinmann, Project Manager at Ed. Züblin AG, Bavaria Directorate.

Over the past few weeks, several hundred core drill holes were drilled into the floor slab with millimetre precision in order to precisely position the anchoring dowels. On the basis of this and other preparatory work, the first timber supports for the first floor could be installed. The next step was to install the beams, followed by the cross-laminated timber walls and ceiling elements, most of which are ribbed ceilings. The non-load-bearing exterior walls of the first floor form the final stage. From the second floor upwards, these timber frame walls are supplied with factory-fitted windows and partially pre-assembled timber façades.

Due to the large number of individual components and the precision required, the assembly of the first floor will take several weeks. Construction progress on the upper floors will then be significantly accelerated, as there will no longer be any need for complex tolerance compensation with the concrete and the connections between the timber components can be made more quickly.