450 days after the ground-breaking ceremony, the shell of Dr. Ing. h. c. F. Porsche AG’s new museum in Stuttgart Zuffenhausen is largely completed as 2006 draws to a close. An important construction phase is thus concluded: the underground car park, ground floor, first floor and central girders, the “cores”, made from reinforced concrete have been constructed. At total of 21,000 cubic meters of concrete have been used. The around 100 employees – partly thanks to the mild weather of recent weeks – have made rapid progress, even during the cold season. Many night shifts were arranged to lift major parts of the construction into place by crane, and on several occasions Schwieberdinger Strasse (B 27) was closed on one side during at night when there was little traffic on the roads.
Lift shafts, stairwells and service channels are now in place in the three building cores. These also serve as heavy load-bearing supports for the exhibition area, which will cover 5,600 square meters and hover over the first floor as a building in its own right. Employees are currently pulling eight inch-thick steel wires through one of the Y-shaped supports. Each of the 22 meter-long wires is secured as an abutment and must be prestressed with a tensile force of 300 tons using a special apparatus. The technology being used is derived from bridge construction and is required on static grounds – to provide sufficient support for the audacious architecture of the new Porsche museum. Once completed, the exhibition area will weigh 35,000 tons and will house 80 valuable museum vehicles and 200 further exhibits from the history of the Zuffenhausen-based car manufacturer.
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