Named the icon of modern India, the Mumbai International Airport is being rebuilt to provide world-class architectural design and futuristic facilities, with Rondo providing both product and technical assistance to the development. Constructing such a huge project is complex, as the airport must continue to run as normal whilst massive developments take place over the 800 hectare site. Rondo provided a solid support foundation, using resources from both our International and Australian Technical Services departments. The South West Pier (Stage 1), was built by Rachana Arts and saw Rondo provide assistance for the corian cladding to the columns by creating adjustable and concealed fixings that were purposely designed for the hollow section support framing, as well as providing Stud and Track to support the various cladding materials. The Skywells Package (Stage 5) of the Mumbai International Airport are located within the ceiling plenum space. This stage involved Rondo supplying Steel Stud Drywall Framing System with some hollow sections to provide immediate support between the main structural steelwork of the roof.
Around the exterior of the main arrivals/departure building, glass fibre reinforced concrete (GFRC) is to be used as the ceiling and column cladding material. This meant Rondo needed to provide a custom ceiling design that could support the GFRC and Bullnose Exterior Ceiling Panels using Rondo Steel Stud and Track components, and prefabricated hollow section trusses. Before approval of this design took place, Rondo’s Technical Representatives worked to fabricate a half scale mock up of the bullnose facade section, which allowed a simulation of the actual construction methods to be employed on site. See photo gallery below. The lifting frame, truss and GFRC support members were all designed in-house with Rondo Australia engineers running a two dimensional structural model of the frame using specialist design software. This provided Rondo India Engineers with the design loads required to enable checking of the proposed framing sections. In addition to the technical support, Rondo Technical Representatives attended weekly site meetings to track the progress of the airport and assist contractors until completion. Mumbai Airport now allows for 40 million passengers per year and is one of the busiest airports in the world.