Eight roofs appraised across a film studio complex, spans to 50 metres

The sound stages are the reason this site is unusual. S5 clear-spans 50.55 metres over a length of 50.78 metres with purlins at 1.66 metre centres and bays at 6 metres, and S2 spans 42.05 metres with an apex at 20.278 metres. A structure carrying that span has very little spare capacity by definition, because the section sizes were driven by the span rather than by the roof loading, and the margin left over for anything added later is correspondingly small.

The ancillary buildings sit at the opposite end of the range. A5 spans 19.646 metres over 80 metres of length with frames at 8.010 metre centres, and A6 and A7 span 14 metres with frames at 7.710 metres. Same site, same client, same proposed installation, and a completely different structural question.

The survey was non-intrusive, inside and out, with particular attention to the roof and its supporting framework. The primary structure was found in good condition for its age with no significant degradation or deflection, and the coverings sound for the building's continued commercial use.

Panel fixings were explicitly excluded and flagged as a design by others. Whether a fixing can be made into a given covering is a different question from whether the frame beneath it has capacity, and reports that blur the two are how responsibility falls into the gap between consultants.