Os edifícios ao lado da sede da Ratos, empresa sueca de private equity, no número 2 da Drottninggatan, em Estocolmo, não albergam vizinhos propriamente comuns. À esquerda encontra-se o edifício Rosenbad, sede do Governo Sueco, e à direita fica a Sager House, a residência oficial do Primeiro-Ministro da Suécia. O telhado de cobre do edifício da Ratos necessitava de ser substituído por um material de cobertura mais moderno, adequado a um grandioso edifício antigo cheio de tradição. Prelaq Nova foi o material eleito para a cobertura.

THE CHALLENGE

To paint or not to paint - that is the question

Ratos wanted to replace the old copper roof with a black roof. The question was whether to apply the paint on site, or to install prepainted steel sheet. Sheet metal consultant Ola Svensson clarifies the concepts:

”Installing sheet metal that is painted on site costs just as much as prepainted sheet, but you also have to pay by the square meter to have it painted. And the quality of a surface painted on site is always inferior to an industrially-applied painted surface. As a result, the property owner gets caught up in the maintenance cycle sooner, rather than later.

"In downtown Stockholm the interval for painting sheet metal that is painted on site is about 6–8 years. By choosing prepainted steel sheet instead, it takes at least twice that time before repainting is needed. So the property owner saves on one repainting, while the initial painting is virtually free.”

THE SOLUTION

Environmental requirements made the choice simple

The City of Stockholm environmental policy recommends against using prepainted steel sheet containing PVC. So the choice was simple. Prelaq Nova from SSAB. Prelaq Nova contains neither PVC nor isocyanates.

CUSTOMER BENEFITS

Easier repainting and maintenace

According to Ola Svensson, there are several good reasons in favor of Prelaq Nova.

“I'm thinking about repainting. To repaint a roof coated with plastisol, you have to remove all of the paint before you can start painting. This means you have to blast-clean the entire roof or use some chemical method. It costs about SEK 150 to 200 per square meter, and then you have the cost of painting on top of that. Repainting a Prelaq Nova roof is much easier and much less expensive. In 12–15 years, when it's time to repaint a Prelaq Nova roof, you just wash off the roof and then you can start painting right away. You never have to remove the old coating. That's a major difference.” 

“Repainting a roof with Prelaq Nova is much easier and much less expensive”