The Sunset Blvd total precast concrete home is a residential project located in Thornbury, Ontario. It consists entirely of architecturally finished structural precast concrete.  

Located on a golf course, the home is in use as a family cottage.  All new construction on the property is governed by a covenant, so products to be used on the exterior facades are strictly controlled.  Luckily, the precaster, Tri-Krete, was able to find a stone liner that was a close match to one of the approved stones.  The siding formliner was custom-made in their plant. Nawkaw Corporation stained all the panels at the facility before transporting them to the site. 

The precast is self-supporting and very minimal steel was required to complete the structure.  The panels are finished using various formliners to achieve the desired look.  Panels were installed using a 90-tonne mobile crane and tilt shores to temporarily support the precast concrete panels.  

The floor slabs were installed first and secured so that the shores were able to tie back to them.  The shores stayed in place until the entire structure was completed and the roof installed.  Tri-Krete was able to erect an average of seven panels a day. With a total 76 panels in the design, it took just over two weeks to complete the installation of the precast.  

The project consisted of 9,000 square feet of precast panels, 3,400 of those floor slabs, and another 5,600 designed as wall panels.  The front porch slab was the largest panel on the project and was poured face up with a stamped concrete finish applied.  The panel measured 33’-3” x 13’-1” and weighed over 37,000 lbs.  Custom frames were made to ship this panel along with some of the other larger panels on the project. 

There were three different types of precast used.  Insulated precast panels with an R12 rating were used in the garage area.  The back of the house, which carried most of the loads, was fabricated using a solid 8” thick panel, and the rest of the wall panels and floor slabs were fabricated using a hybrid structural steel stud precast system.  

The panel composition with the steel stud for the wall panels was a 3” layer of concrete with a 10” single embedded steel stud every 12” oc.   The floor slabs have a 4” layer of concrete with a 10” embedded stud every 12” oc.  There are two studs welded back-to-back on the floor slabs at every stud location, and the floors were designed for 100 lbs/sq-ft loading. The windows and doors on the project were also installed in the fabrication shop.  The panels were then shipped and erected with these windows and doors in place.