PRESS RELEASE | 9 november 2005

OCTATUBE GIVES WINGS TO YITZHAK RABIN CENTER

Delft, 7th of November 2005 – The five overwhelming, white wings on the Yitzhak Rabin Center in Tel Aviv are a Dutch coup de main, realized under direction of company Octatube in Delft. These free formed roof shells, which symbolize two peace doves, cover the Great Hall and the Library. Next Monday, 14th of November, this Center will be opened in memory of the Israeli prime minister who was murdered 10 years ago.

Dalia Rabin, daughter of Yitzhak Rabin and chairwoman of the foundation “Friends of the Yitzhak Rabin Center”: “The wings symbolize an important transition in the life of my father. During his lifetime he went from being Israel’s defender to its peacemaker. Moshe Safdie, the architect of the building, captures my father’s spirit and the impor-tant work of our Center with these rooftop structures.”

The international tendering procedure for the roofs with the accompanying steel construction and glass facades was won, due to an innovative concept, by Octatube, the design & build company of professor Mick Eekhout, and an project syndicate of co-makers. As the roofs were approached as free spanning shells a lightweight construction could be proposed and developed. For the shells a glassfiber reinforced composite material is used, combined with a production technique known from aircraft and yachting industries. The submitted solution was the answer to the architects wish to make the free formed roofs as thin, smooth and seamless as possible. The composite shells are a world innovation for the construc-tion sector, of which especially ‘liquid design’ schemes in architecture can make further use of.

Mick Eekhout, director of Octatube International and professor for product develop-ment at Technical University Delft: “Exciting, as now I had to make my boasting come true. I knew for sure that it was possible to make such huge free spanning composite structures, but nobody had done it so far. For experiments of this kind in the very con-servative construction sector with tight budgets a careful engineering approach had to be taken.” [NRC Handelsblad, November 5th, 2005, ‘Vredesduif met blobvleugels’ door Dap Hartmann]

With an awarded pre engineering contract Octatube translated the proposal into a technical viable solution, always in close consultation with the foundation ‘Friends of the Yitzhak Rabin Center’, the architect and the Israeli project consultants. After the complete contract was awarded the final engineering phase was entered. The glass facades as well as the double curved steel construction were produced in Delft at Octatube, also coordination of engineering, transport and assembly was done there. The production of the shell roofs was done by a cluster of Dutch companies. At Holland Composites Industrials from Lelystad the shells from glass fiber reinforced polyester, also known as GRP, were made. To make transport possible they were made in 70 segments. The structural calculations and the structural detailing of the GRP parts are done by Solico from Oosterhout. The necessary moulds for the production of the GRP panels were milled by Nedcam in Ede. In Israel the construction activities were limited to the structural connection of the shell segments on ground level, also the finishing layers were applied here. After this the shells were lifted into place one after each other.

The GRP shells, with a thickness between 200 and 300 millimeters, are made using a vacuum injection method, a specialty from Holland Composites. The core of the shells made from PIR foam is covered by glass fiber cloth, which is then injected with polyester resin under a vacuum condition. The moulds from polystyrene foam used for the production of the different segments describe the exact negative form of each segment and had to be produced for each segment separately, as no repetition can be found in the whole geometry. To achieve a structural connection between the upper and lower shell skin GRP stringers are put into place in the shells. With steel inserts inside the shell, connected to the stringers, the shells are connected to the outside steel construction.