Vale of Aylesbury Housing Trust is a not-for-profit registered social landlord (RSL) providing affordable housing for more than 17,000 people across Buckinghamshire. With a stock of nearly 8,500 homes, it is always looking for new and innovative ways to improve safety and customer service and keep costs down, maintaining its goal to develop neighbourhoods that provide thriving places to live.
In January 2017, the Trust made a commitment to cease hot works in its properties. It turned to Geberit’s Mapress press fit system for water and gas piping systems. Since that time Vale of Aylesbury Housing Trust has purchased in excess of 50 Geberit pressing tools, demonstrating its commitment to Mapress as it seeks to provide safer, quicker and more reliable pipe connections.
Why Geberit
Vale of Aylesbury Housing Trust continues to use Mapress copper pipes and fittings, including dedicated copper gas fittings for gas systems, for a rolling programme of new installations and upgrades across its properties.
The Mapress press fit technology is quicker to install than traditional jointing methods because it requires no hot works, no soldering and no threading. The Trust’s in-house heating engineers simply need to cut the pipe to size, debur the inside and outside, mark the socket insertion depth on the pipe, push the pipe into the socket of the fitting, then press the joint and connecting pipe using the pressing tool.
Coloured pressing indicators are fitted in the seal rings, which offer easy identification of both the material and any unpressed joints during the installation process.
In addition to speed, it means a safer job on site, which has enabled the Trust to reduce its public liability insurance premiums, whilst also benefiting from proven system reliability.
Delivering the solution
Geberit also provides a dedicated technical sales manager to support the Trust’s operatives and wider team. This includes working closely with the investment works team to answer any technical product queries, provide training and certification to operatives in advance of receiving their tooling, and providing post-installation support if required.
Since switching to Mapress in 2017, Vale of Aylesbury Housing Trust has not experienced a single system failure across hundreds of installations, demonstrating the quality made possible by product innovation, enhanced installation methods and comprehensive training for operatives.
Steve Wallin, operations business manager, Investment Works, for Vale Of Aylesbury Housing Trust, said: “Geberit worked closely with our team to deliver an effective solution combining fit-for-purpose products, comprehensive training and post-installation support.
“We have been delighted with the quality of installations and it’s clear to see the enhancements made possible by Geberit’s Mapress system.”
