If you’re an ENGINEER, CERTIFIER, LOCAL GOVERNMENT, CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, MASONRY CONTRACTOR or BUILDING OWNER you need to understand the Australian Standard AS3700

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ELIMINATE THE RISK OF MISPLACED REINFORCEMENT
PREPARE FOR THE DESIGN & BUILDING PRACTITIONERS ACT 2020 – Effective 1 JULY 2021

USE BLOCKAID BAR CHAIRS AND SIGN THE DESIGNER AND BUILDERS DECLARATION WITHOUT RISK & COMPLY TO AS3700-2018 & NCC-2019

The NSW Building Comissioner is aware of masonry reinforcement location issues. The use of Bar Chairs will improve construction to overcome poor workmanship.

BLOCKAID BAR CHAIRS ARE A “DEEMED TO SATISFY” SOLUTION TO MEET THE PERFORMANCE REQUIREMENTS FOR REINFORCED MASONRY

Testimonials

The research revealed that the use of BlockAid resulted in a complete wall structure that met the requirements of AS3700-2001 Masonry Structures in terms of achieving correct reinforcement positioning, consistently achieving greater accuracy than conventional best practice. Moreover, it achieved a construction speed comparable with commonly encountered, low quality practices, and resulted in construction times 20% faster than best practice, wire tied techniques.
University of Newcastle, School of Architecture & Built Environment
From our experience, BlockAid bar chairs are the only chair that can guarantee that the wall will meet its design potential.
Forum Consulting Engineers

BlockAid ensured the wall was built to the specification and that a steel fixer was no longer required. BlockAid eliminated vertical lapped joints to save 35% of vertical steel and BlockAid eliminated lifting blocks over vertical steel bars.

Hancock & Owen Services
To build a block wall without BlockAid now would be ridiculous, in fact, it would border on structural negligence.
Evan Graham, Master Builder

I am convinced that this is the best procedure available to guarantee the perfect location of all reinforcement.

BDEA Consulting

SAVE TIME, SAVE MONEY

With the horizontal reinforcement captured securely by BlockAid, the vertical reinforcement can be inserted in one length through the BlockAids, locating the vertical bars securely during the core filling process and eliminating the need to tie or weld the steel. There are significant savings in construction time by eliminating welding or tying. The time saved by using BlockAid to locate the reinforcement offsets the purchase price of BlockAid, providing risk free compliance at no added cost.

SAVE MATERIAL, SAVE MONEY

When BlockAid is used, the vertical reinforcement is inserted in one length through the BlockAids with no tying or welding required, even on Hi-Risk sites, such as petroleum, ammunition and gas storage, where welding is common practice. By inserting full length vertical bars, a substantial saving in material is achieved, compared to welding multiple lapped vertical bars as the courses are laid.

SAVE LABOUR, SAVE MONEY

On Hi-Risk or Critical sites, such as petroleum, ammunition and gas storage, welding the vertical steel in place as the wall is being built, is common practice. With the use of BlockAid to accurately and securely locate the reinforcement, there is no longer a need to engage a steel fixer to weld the reinforcement, providing a substantial saving in labour.

BlockAid Bar Chairs for Block Work are proven to accurately locate the horizontal and vertical reinforcement to save money, reduce risk and ensure Compliance to AS3700-2018 and NCC-2019.

  • ACHIEVE COMPLIANCE TO AUSTRALIAN STANDARD AS3700

    BlockAid Bar Chairs accurately locate the horizontal reinforcement as the blocks are laid and provide an aperture for the vertical reinforcement to be inserted into the wall, resulting in an accurate lattice of reinforcement throughout the entire wall, to achieve compliance to Australian Standard AS3700.

    Australian Governments, Engineers and Certifiers have a vested interest to specify the mandatory use of “bar chairs for blockwork” to improve work practice and achieve compliance for block walls, thereby ensuring block wall assets are insurable.

  • ACHIEVE RISK FREE CERTIFICATION

    With the reinforcement located and captured by BlockAid, the certifier can easily identify a correctly located lattice of reinforcement throughout the wall to confidently certify that the wall achieves compliance to AS3700, eliminating any risk of litigation for certifying a wall that was found to have non-compliant reinforcement.

  • ACHIEVE PROTECTION FOR THE ASSET OWNER

    To protect owners of masonry block assets there are regulations in place to ensure block walls are built to comply to Australian Standards but evidence shows that the reinforcement in block walls is generally non-compliant. Governments, Structural Engineers, Certifiers, Builders, Construction Companies and Block Layers have a responsibility to owners of assets to ensure masonry block walls are constructed in compliance with AS3700 to achieve durability expectations and to avoid the risk of insurance companies denying claims where walls fail from non-compliant reinforcement.

  • ACHIEVE RISK FREE INSURABILITY OF MASONRY WALL ASSETS

    With the reinforcement located and captured by BlockAid in accordance with AS3700, there is no longer the risk of insurance claims being denied where non-compliant reinforcement is identified as the root cause of the wall failure.

BlockAid Bar Chairs accurately locate the horizontal reinforcement as the blocks are laid and provide an aperture for the vertical reinforcement to be inserted into the wall, resulting in an accurate lattice of reinforcement throughout the entire wall, to achieve compliance to AS3700.

Australian Governments, Engineers and Certifiers have a vested interest to specify the mandatory use of “bar chairs for blockwork” to improve work practice and achieve compliance for block walls, thereby ensuring block wall assets are insurable.

* The Marine Environment (ISO Category 3) extends inland along the Queensland and NSW coast beyond the general distance of 10 kilometres from the surf coast to about 50 kilometres in exceptional circumstances, which includes the Gold Coast, Newcastle, Sydney and Wollongong, thereby increasing the minimum cover to 15mm in these extended areas.