Castelão: works gain new wind

Work enters new phase with the beginning of the installation of pillars to sustain the stadium’s roof covering

The pillars that will provide support for the metallic covering of the Plácido Aderaldo Castelo Stadium  (aka Castelão) in the city of Fortaleza - Ceará have begun to be erected. Sixty portals of steel distributed around the original circle, upon which the roof covering will rest, will also serve as dampers to deaden vibrations. With this installation, Castelão is the first stadium in Brazil to start assembling the roof of the country’s new arenas. The works are being performed by a construction consortium formed by the Galvão Engineering and Andrade Mendonça companies.

Installation is expected to be concluded by April 20th. According to Waldemar Biselli, contract manager for the project, “All the parts of the portals have already been shipped from São Paulo and are bound for the state of Ceará where the parts are being assembled. The pillars, consisting of 301 parts, are assembled at the work site itself and together weigh about 25 tons”, he explains.

The steel portals are prefabricated, manufactured with steel pipes and scissor trusses made of the same material, and have up to 42 meters in height. They will support the trusses that will be 3 meters tall and 57 meters long. This covering will have about 60 meters cantilevered, that is, without supporting pillars, supported only by metallic tiebacks. The metal components of the structure were designed of carbon steel, painted with epoxy and polyurethane type paint, resistant to a marine atmosphere, ensuring virtually unlimited durability.

The roof covering project was designed to ensure comfort to spectators providing 100% covered seats. The type of covering - trapezoid-shaped tiles covered with a thick layer of insulation with a top-surface finishing of TPO (thermoplastic polyolefin) membrane - was chosen to provide optimal thermal comfort to spectators. In addition, approximately 20% of the covering will be made of polycarbonate to ensure a gradient in shading, which is important for reducing the intensity of sunlight on the grass playing field and the quality of TV transmission.      OU   TV broadcasts.

An assessment made by the Castelão Building Consortium indicates that, at the end of December last year, the project had reached 53% completion. The work of construction is performed on four concurrent fronts. Two have been concluded. When completed, the arena will be the largest in the country’s North/Northeast regions. The stadium will host a Confederations Cup 2013 semi-final and six games of the FIFA 2014 World Cup. The Castelão stadium is expected to ready December 2012

Among the changes are the lowering of the playing field by four meters to ensure full visibility for all the fans and a roof lined with thermal and acoustic insulation to provide greater comfort and safety for spectators.