Our designs for the Stephen Perse Foundation incorporates a world first (we think)….a flitch truss or wall.

Smith and Wallwork used the principle of a timber flitch beam and scaled it up to incorporate a thin steel plate truss sandwiched between two CLT walls. The CLT walls stop the thin steel plate truss from buckling and the thin steel plate truss supports 4 storeys of building over 2no. 9m wide openings, to allow the bleacher seating units to pass through.

We took a thermal imaging camera to site to see if we could detect the steel behind the CLT walls. We will try again on a cold morning when the temperature differential between steel and timber is likely to be greatest.