HEALTH AND SAFETY IN THE FRAME

Picture above:  The Vocational College’s Health and Safety Manager John Bradshaw delivers the training using over 20 years’ experience in health and safety in the glass industry.

The Vocational College prides itself on instilling a strong health and safety ethic in all its students. The health and safety award-winning college, which runs apprenticeships for the glazing industry, has introduced a range of training initiatives related to health and safety in the glass industry.

Health and safety compliance can be difficult to meet, but with the Classic membership, aimed at businesses with between five and 50 employees, TVC provides comprehensive up-to-date health and safety documentation, covering all aspects of this important but complicated area. Peace of mind is ensured at a cost of just £500

The £2000 Premium membership fee is aimed at medium-to-large businesses employing 50 to 250 staff. In addition to the benefits that the Classic membership provides, the Premium also includes an annual health and safety audit and action plan, and access to a competent health and safety practitioner with OSHCR membership who is a chartered member of IOSH. This higher level of membership also includes use of a dedicated health and safety telephone helpline and reduced prices for IOSH training courses.

Other services on offer outside these two key packages include guidance on CHAS compliance, Construction Phase Plan CDM 2015 and short courses on Manual Handling, Asbestos Awareness, Working at Height and Heart Start.

Health and Safety Manager John Bradshaw delivers the service using over 20 years’ experience in health and safety in the glass industry. John is a member of the Occupational Safety and Health Consultants Register (OSHCR), which is bound by its professional body’s code of conduct and committed to providing sensible and proportionate health and safety advice.

John Bradshaw, Health and Safety Manager at TVC, explains: “We’re committed to ensuring that the college’s reputation for reliable, credible health and safety advice continues to be recognised as industry-leading. We have always made sure that the specific needs and concerns of employers and employees are addressed, and that all the advice we provide is useful and practical. My extensive experience in this field is useful in identifying areas of importance.

“On-site, glass can be one of the most dangerous materials to handle safely, so knowing beforehand what to expect and how to react to situations is something everyone in the industry needs to be aware of. We’re very pleased to be able to offer a health and safety solution that covers a wide range of issues in a straightforward, comprehensive way”.

At its core, the college offers a range of specialist apprenticeships in the field of glazing, from manufacture and handling all the way through to on-site installation. The college’s award-winning glass department hosts GQA qualifications and diplomas and has a team of 40 tutors and assessors based throughout the UK, four internal verifiers and a delivery coordinator. In addition, TVC also offers a range of training initiatives related to health and safety in the glass industry.

For further information on apprenticeship opportunities available to new and existing staff in the UK, contact Paul Gray, business development manager at The Vocational College, on 0151 944 1744.

Mila’s Test Centre in Daventry has just been awarded UKAS accreditation, allowing it to formally assess window and door hardware to both PAS24 2016 for security and BS EN1670 2007 for corrosion resistance.

This is the culmination of many months of hard work by the specialist Mila team behind the Test Centre, where the focus is exclusively on testing of windows and doors. It has centred around the fine calibration of equipment and the formalisation of procedures to meet the strict UKAS audit requirements.

In recent years, the Test Centre has been used primarily to test and validate Mila’s own products in development and to provide indicative testing for customers, before their windows and doors were submitted for formal testing elsewhere.

Now though, Mila is responding to requests from those same customers to provide a One Stop Shop facility, with both indicative and formal testing all available under one roof.

Danny Jones, Testing Engineer, said: “As well as our specialism in this sector, what sets us apart from other testing centres is the fact that we offer advice and guidance to customers at the indicative stage to make sure that their windows and doors are set up correctly in order to pass the various tests that follow. For security testing in particular, that might mean advising them on the combination of locking system and handle, or even which screws to use. We essentially make sure that customers don’t spend money on formal testing until we can be sure that their products will pass. That’s a huge advantage – not just in terms of money spent but also in time saved.”

The next stage in the development of Mila’s Test Centre is to achieve UKAS accreditation on its cycle and weather testing to BS6375.

The company then plans to announce a programme of incentives for customers so that they can make maximum use of what Mila believes is the only facility in the UK hardware sector offering this combination of indicative and formal testing together.

More details are available at: www.mila.co.uk

It was an obvious choice for Apeer R&D engineer Paul Vajda to have one of the doors he helped to design for his own home near the company’s Ballymena factory recently. So it was just as natural, when his father-in-law wanted a new front door, that Paul would recommend the company’s radical Lumi system.

The result, a striking combination of Lumi composite door with two full-height glazed sidelights in Chartwell Green exterior, with Winchester foil inside to complement the oak flooring, was obviously well-received as the customer is now looking to order matching Lumi windows.

Just as with the acclaimed Lumi windows, the entire system, door frame and sash is made of glass-fibre reinforced profiles and is triple glazed as standard. As well as U-Values as low as 0.8 W/m²K, the Lumi door is exceptionally strong and of course every component, from windows, entrance doors, patio and bi-folds, is perfectly co-ordinated in the same iconic styling that has marked Lumi since its launch in 2015.

The door was fitted by Apeer’s own fitting team manager Gary Neil, who said: “The system was designed for easy retrofit installation as well as new-build and that proved to be the case here. Once the old door was out, the new one was in and complete in just a couple of hours.”

Apeer Marketing Manager Linda Tomb added: “The look of the finished door shows once again that the Lumi system is just as much at home in a traditional setting as in the contemporary it was initially designed for. We can’t wait to see how the whole house will look when it has the full set of Lumi windows to match.”

Lumi proved to be a show-stopper from day one when the radically different window system was unveiled at Grand Designs London in 2015. Demand has grown exponentially since then and the system has been extended with the addition of patio and bi-fold doors as well as entrance doors, so now there is no installation, retrofit or new-build, that could not be completely fulfilled with Lumi.

www.apeer.co.uk

Since REHAU launched its AGILA sliding doors range sales of the PVC-U doors have been steadily growing and now more fabricators than ever are choosing to specify AGILA.

AGILA sliding doors are great for modern living, letting in light and creating openness in any space. They can be installed as a traditional patio door, entrance door or door to a conservatory, and are available in eight different colour options to provide a flexible solution which can be tailored to the individual needs of the customer. A perfect fit for REHAU’s popular TOTAL70 windows system, the AGILA sliding door also offers continuity of product across larger specifications.

As well as slimmer sightlines and superior aesthetics, AGILA sliding doors are incredibly energy efficient, with a triple glazing option on offer. They also come with enhanced security options and benefit from ERA’s new Total Security Guarantee for complete peace of mind.

Currently there are ten businesses fabricating the AGILA Sliding Door across the UK and Ireland. These include Climatec, Fenster Trade Frames, GRM, Polyframe, Euroglaze, Stormking, Hadrian, Costello PVC, O’Grady UPVC Ltd and Caledonia Doors in Cumbernauld being the most recent company to come on board .

To increase interest further, REHAU has released a new video online which highlights all the great features of the AGILA sliding doors to promote the product to fabricators and their customers.

Clare Higgins, Product Manager, from REHAU said: “The AGILA sliding door has been a fantastic addition to our doors offer, providing our partners with a high quality and flexible door solution they can offer to their customers individually or as part of a full portfolio of REHAU products. With the trend for large span doors continuing to gather pace in the domestic market, we expect to see even more contractors choosing to offer our sliding doors over the coming months and years.”

For further information please visit www.rehau.uk/agila

Epwin Windows Systems has won the BPF Energy Award 2017 for the facility BPF/F00150 within the Climate Change Agreement. The award was given in recognition of the company’s ‘considerable ongoing commitment’ to energy reduction throughout its Telford extrusion plant, where all main profile systems are produced.

In previous years the award was said to have been solely based around improvement in the Climate Change Agreement (CCA) Specific Energy Consumption (SEC). However, for the past two years the award has reportedly had a bias towards an absolute energy reduction criterion at facility level.

According to Epwin, it is a mark of success of the major investment that it has made during 2015/2016 in energy reduction in its manufacturing process.

The award was presented by the president of the British Plastics Federation on 12 October at the BPF annual dinner, which was held at the Lancaster Hotel, London and attended by 515 people from across the plastics industry.

Epwin Window Systems’ divisional operations director, Andy Bevan, commented: “We are absolutely delighted to have been awarded the BPF Energy Award 2017 for the facility BPF/F00150 within the Climate Change Agreement. This award can be given to any business in the plastics industry sector so to win it is a significant achievement. As a business, we are totally committed to reducing our carbon footprint across all areas of the business, particularly our manufacturing processes. We look forward to continuing to drive forward in our commitment.”

The post Going green appeared first on Glass & Glazing Products Magazine (GGP).

The fully thermally broken Stratus lantern roof from Synseal Group is on track to hit 1000 fully fabricated sales within its first year, on top of the success that Synseal’s bar length fabricators have found with this great new product. Sales of the aluminium lantern roof system have consistently grown every quarter since it was launched in September 2016 with customers loving the sleek aluminium exterior, slim sightlines and genuine thermal efficiency. Despite being launched at a typically quiet time of year, Stratus was an instant hit with Synseal’s roof customers, in part thank to a sneak peek at the 2016 FIT Show which whet their appetite for the fully thermally broken design. On show was the Contemporary style which supports the ridge solely by the hip rafters, creating a product which maximises the area of glazing in sizes up to 1.5m x 3m. For larger applications Stratus is also available in Two-way and Three-way styles up to an impressive 3m x 6m. The carefully designed thermally broken eaves beam has been finished in black so from a birds eye view, the perimeter appears as a discreet shadow line even on the largest Stratus lanterns. 

Looking back at the launch of Stratus last year, Synseal’s Andy Jones said:“We were signing up a new fabricator every week to sell Stratus when it first launched, and now have more than half of our roof fabricators offering Stratus in addition to their Celsius Solid Roof, Global and K2 products. Sales had been steadily increasing even through the winter months, and over this summer we’ve been selling more than 100 fully fabricated each month – a sign of the market demand for an aluminium lantern roof that has slimmer sightlines, discreet cappings and architectural styling that complements the growing trend for aluminium finishes in window and door applications. These stunning looks, coupled with thermal benefits of up to 65% better thermal efficiency than conventional aluminium systems, has proven to be a winner with our customers.”

The post 1,000 fully fabricated sales within first year for Stratus lantern roof appeared first on Windows Active Magazine.

Synseal Group shows no sign of slowing down as it launches its new WarmCore Inline Patio system this month, as promised at the FIT Show earlier this year. The aluminium patio dominated attention on the WarmCore stand at the exhibition in May as customers and competitors came to gauge the hotly anticipated new product from the WarmCore range. Developed with self-levelling, ten wheel roller sets sourced from Australia and a bi-directional lock, operated by Synseal’s unique vertically operating handle, the WarmCore inline patio is a modern take on a traditional homeowner favourite. The patio has been designed with a contemporary flush finish between the sash and outer frame, complete with the advanced thermal performance you’d expect from the latest member of the WarmCore family. WarmCore’s proven composite structure of a thermal PVC-U core encased in hardwearing aluminium has been adapted for an inline patio system that produces U-values of 1.4 W/m²K double glazed and is also available with triple glazing, producing U-values as low as 1.0 W/m²K. The patio has also been designed with modern touches including a thermally broken anti-separation bracket, protective safety break mechanism to prevent trapped fingers, and a thermally broken low threshold option.

Phil Parry, Head of R&D at Synseal Group, said: “We’ve been delighted with the interest the WarmCore patio has generated since we previewed the product at the FIT Show earlier this year and we’ve been inundated with calls from customers eager to add the patio to their WarmCore range as soon as possible. What we’ve developed is a new generation inline patio which we anticipate will be very popular as a sleek, aluminium replacement for outdated wooden and PVC-U systems, offering the unique combination of thermal excellence and aluminium aesthetics at an affordable price.”

The new WarmCore Inline Patio Door is currently available fully fabricated up to a maximum four-pane door style. Available in white and anthracite grey internal and external, with dual colour available on the same lead times. The patio system will be rolled out to bar length customers later in the year, when it will be available in mill finish for powder coating in any RAL colour.

The post The WarmCore patio is now available appeared first on Windows Active Magazine.