February 12, 2021February 25, 2021 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – Weeks 40 to 44

Visual updates have been somewhat limited throughout January, hence the delayed publishing of this five week instalment of the Build Blog.

The bulk of time and effort on-site is still being spent on end-out plans, and getting the energisation works underway. Alongside this, we’ve also been carrying out supplementary works in a number of areas, to keep things progressing while time is spent on final stage plans.

Weekly overview

In terms of physical on-site work, we’ve been keeping tempo with a range of works across a number of areas, all of which have helped to keep visual progress steady (but comparatively limited) while the next phase is executed behind the scenes.

Because visual change is somewhat limited at the moment, we have a lesser number of photos available in this instalment, however they do show various changes and arrivals throughout the site.

Switchgear — Some of our switchgear and electrical distribution infrastructure has started arriving on-site, destined for LV rooms and data halls – our primary LV boards are still being manufactured, and will be with us soon

Distro — Here we see one of our Mardix intelligent distribution boards, this variant being for M&E equipment with integrated ATS, freestanding for test placement in Data Hall 1

One of our new Ortronics ODFs, which will handle fibre distribution at NLE

Lighting — The ground floor lighting has progressed, with the overhead cabling seen coming together here in Data Hall 4 – the left side shows an area which has been loomed, moving towards the right, which is being held apart until it’s ready to be bundled, in order

Checkerplate — The ground floor access corridor with completed checker plate, to match the first floor – checker plating for phase one is now very nearly complete

Turnstile — A view of the turnstile frame now in place, pending final completion, which has been slightly delayed thanks to the very visible snow

Scaffold — Again snow-related, preparative works on the roof have been postponed due to the visible weather – access for this initial preparation work is via our scaffold tower, as seen here

Doorstops — A small addition, however all internal door systems have now had their door stops fitted, to prevent over-opening and damage to doors and/or walls

The first KVM / crash cart is now on-site ready for client use in Data Hall 1 – this is an Ergotron model, which we’ll be deploying across the board here at NLE, along with their monitor mounting systems in the build room

The ground floor areas that were due checker plate cladding as part of the phase one roll-out have now had all areas completed, aside from a couple of missing sheets; we’re now waiting on additional material to arrive with us. This will also allow for checker plating and associated bash protection to be installed in the loading bay, where equipment will be lifted to each level loading dock for both the ground and first floors.

The ground floor has also had its final lighting systems cabled and energised, meaning that all site lighting can now be removed – a great milestone in terms of this becoming a self-supported utility it its final guise.

The main front-of-building turnstile came back to us late last year, having been to our powder coaters to ensure a match with the existing system at London Central. This was installed towards the end of 2020, however has yet to have its internals fitted to the overhead containment tray. This will be done when weather permits, given the current snowy state of the UK earlier this week!

Some of our new electrical boards have started arriving on-site. These are largely our new Mardix units, which have been built in a number of varieties depending on the end use case, and delivered in our signature orange. These really pop against the otherwise monochrome data halls, turning out just as we had planned. The larger of the two orange board types each hold a self-contained ATS to allow for dual incoming feeds for all critical M&E equipment.

Most of the VESDA equipment is now on-site, aside from the red pipework that will be installed to collect the air samples. This forms part of the final fire protection plans, which are being completed in the next couple of weeks.

You can also see that our comms panels (ODFs) from Ortronics have arrived, which will be used to handle and distribute fibre from each A and B core. These will be installed as part of the network roll-out at London East, which is set to begin later in this final stage of works.

We’ve also had a team up on the main roof this week, however things were postponed slightly due to adverse weather. Despite there being no issues with the roof, we’re electing to have the roof resealed for our own peace of mind; something we did at London Central also. This will lead onto roof and skin adjustments for apertures in due course, both for personnel access and our cooling system.

What else has been happening?

The bulk of progress in January has definitely fallen into the ‘else’ category when it comes to the Build Blog, as the vast majority of time continues to be spent on desk work, bringing together the final elements that will enable client services to go live at NLE.

Those elements include LV and HV electrical, which form the bulk of the end-out process. The transformer equipment and the generators fall into this work category, which were ordered this week. We’re very excited to share the delivery of these items as they begin to land with us!

We’ve also finalised plans for everything on the fire protection side of the project, which will be installed concurrently with the main power systems.

Excitingly, we’re also having some really interesting conversations with organisations interested in taking space from day one. These range from simple DR services to support primary systems elsewhere, through to full private pods, custom designed to requirement.

What’s next?

We have a very large shipment arriving with us soon, holding all of the containment for the first pod of racks in Data Hall 1 – this is something we’ve been excited to receive for some time, and equally something we’re very excited to share with you here.

January 12, 2021January 12, 2021 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – Weeks 37 to 39

Our team enjoyed some much-needed time off over Christmas, following a long run of works on-site at NLE in the closing months of 2020.

This first instalment of the Build Blog for the new year shows the current state of the facility as we head firmly into 2021 – the year in which our new site will launch to clients for the first time.

Before we start, did you catch our NLE envelope time lapse video? If not, here it is again for your viewing pleasure!

Weekly overview

The first few weeks of January have primarily been comprised of desk work, bringing end-out plans together as we enter the next phase of development.

As part of this, we’ve made great strides in finalising plans for our diverse dark fibre routes, which we will be announcing very soon.

Aside to planning work, we’ve also been completing some smaller tasks on-site, which have helped keep progress up despite the Christmas break and the focus on more general plans and scheduling.

So here’s an update of photos showing additional work completed since our last update, along with some general site photos to serve as a starting point for the Build Blog in 2021.

DH1 — A look at the checkerplate which flanks both sides of Data Hall 1 (and will follow in all other halls), protecting walls behind the outward-facing row of racks in each pod

DH1 — A look at the evaporative cooling system and cold corridor containment at the rear of Data Hall 1, with the flanking checkerplate on both sides of the room visible

DH1 — Here we see the rear of the CREC system in Data Hall 1, which is the cold corridor space

DH1 — One of the two supplementary air conditioning downflow units in place in Data Hall 1

DH1 — A look across Data Hall 1, to the temporarily placed racks, showing the second supplementary air conditioning downflow unit in place

DH2 — Here we see the two supplementary downflow AC units in place in Data Hall 2, ready for future occupancy

DH2 — This is the full blank system in place in Data Hall 2, which will be replaced with evaporative coolers at the time of conversion into an occupiable colocation space

DH2 — This closer view of the custom blanking system, which is used to create the dynamic cold corridor space, shows full population with blanks – there are final finishing blank strips to be installed along the top of the plinths, along the floor edge

DH2 — This is a rear view of the CREC blanking system in Data Hall 2, comprised exclusively of blanks, with the rear access panels for filter changes in the plinths visible along the floor line

First Floor Loading — Our first floor loading bay has also now been clad in checkerplate

Loading — A view down into the loading bay, as the warehouse checkerplate sheets for that area are test-fitted

DH3 — Data Hall 3 on the ground floor is currently being used as an extended storage room while works are ongoing

DH3 — An alternative view of Data Hall 3, and some of the items currently held in this space while works continue

DH4 — Data Hall 4 remains the emptiest white space inside the new facility at this time

DH4 — This view of Data Hall 4 shows the adaptable cold corridor space that will hold the future cooling plant for this space, in whichever format best suits at the time of fit-out – this also leaves options open for private room conversion for a single large tenant

This view from the rear corner of the DR suite space shows the room ready for future fit-out, later in the build process

Ground Floor Loading — This is the ground floor loading bay, looking out into the warehouse, which sits directly below the first floor space of the same nature

Ground Corridor — A look down the ground floor access corridor, with the entrances to Data Halls 3 and 4 seen on the right – this space will have its checkerplate installed in the coming weeks

Entrance — A view down the entry way ramp to the speed gates, which are close to having their integration completed

Lift — The first floor atrium at the top of the stairs, showing the lift internals nearing completion

Stairs — The view down to the entrance ramp, from the first floor atrium / landing, with what will be our two-story green wall clad in timber on the left

This is a view inside one of our LV power rooms, with some of the UPS and battery enclosures in temporary dust wraps held for future use in this space

This is the same LV room as above, looking out towards one of the the risers (left) and the ground floor loading bay

This is the second LV room, a reflection of the first, with the same kit in temporary dust wraps ready for future deployment

The reversed viewing angle from the above LV room, again showing a riser (right), leading into the ground floor atrium

The completed feature / texture wall in place in the NLE meeting space, which matches the tiles used on the large feature wall at the NLC NOC

Build Room — This is our new build room and customer breakout area, with some white goods now on-site ahead of kitchen installation in due course

The checkerplate is the most obvious visual addition since the last instalment of the Build Blog, covering the walls in all high foot fall customer routes. This gives much-needed protection and a great deal of added visual energy to the space. Custom plates for all high risk doors will also be installed soon.

The reason for having most of the ceiling tiles still in a state of removal is simply for ease of ongoing access. We still need easy accessibility above the grid for cabling overhead services during the build, and as such we will only be installing the tiles once access requirements calm down. This is to ensure the tiles are installed with the least amount of disturbance once in place.

As you can see from the wider facility photo set, the progress made in the last ~8 months is impressive to say the least. As a reminder of where we’ve come from in that time, we’ve included a set of day one photos of the space below.

Warehouse 1 — A view from the rear of the main warehouse area

Warehouse 3 — The main warehouse space, viewed from the front, with the existing amenities block in view

Office NOC — A view across the office and future NOC area

What our team have managed to achieve in this time is staggering (even more so as this all occurred in the middle of a global pandemic!), and we’re incredibly proud of everyone involved, particularly as we move onto the next phase of energisation, preparing us for launch later this year.

What else has been happening?

We’ve expanded our team!

We’ll be making the official announcement soon, although the hawked eyed among you may have already seen this causing quite a stir online.

We’ve also been going through our first ISO recertification audit, following our initial accreditation to both ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 back in 2017. This will renew our certificates for another three years, with annual surveillance audits covering the 12 month cycles in between. The scope of our certifications will be expanded later this year, to include the new NLE site. This is our first fully remote audit, thanks to the COVID pandemic, which has been an interesting new approach to the audit process.

What’s next?

Planning on the next phase of electrical works will continue, with a number of exciting developments to announce very soon.

We’ll also be continuing with a wide variety of supplementary works, which will includes taking delivery of our first customer enclosure pod; racks, containment, blanks etc, which will allow us to layout our first occupiable colocation space within Data Hall 1.

December 18, 2020 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – Weeks 35 and 36

As we head towards the Holiday Season, we’ve been able to clear away a range of outstanding tasks on our list, setting things up nicely for the continuation of scheduled work in Q1 2021.

This short entry covers the items that have seen progress in the weeks leading up to the Festive holiday.

Weekly overview

We’ll be keeping this post relatively brief, however we’ve seen dramatic developments in a couple of key areas; cooling and lighting.

The entire first floor is now fully lit through the Klik system, which provides power to our overhead LED panels. This means that all temporary site lighting on the first floor can now be removed. Emergency bulkheads have also been wired up, ready for final directional label application in due course.

We’ve also built out our cooling system much further, with Data Halls 1 and 2 now very near completion, ahead of plumbing and cabling. The supplementary air conditioning systems are now also in place, pending commissioning much later in the project.

Lights — We lit up the first floor of the facility with full overhead lighting for the first time

Fire Stairs — Although our new first floor fire exit got installed a little while back, we haven’t yet shown it – here it is, providing a new fire exit route to the rear of the first floor data halls

Cooling — Here we see the cooling system being married up to its custom blanking system

The past few weeks have been vital in driving the project forwards, as we continue to line up the various items required for the next phase of the build.

What else has been happening?

We have two new deployments underway in Frankfurt and Amsterdam, which have been in the works now for some time. These will reach completion in the next few weeks, with a large number of high-specification servers and high-performance connectivity rolling out in both locations.

These have both been top-to-bottom deployments for us, from consultation, hardware supply, project management, right through to provisioning.

We’re very excited to see these two new systems come online. Amsterdam will be a new location for Netwise, and the roll-out in Frankfurt sees us expand our existing footprint in Germany’s most important data centre hub.

We’ve also had confirmation this week of our plans for fully diverse fibre routes back to our core nodes in THN and LD8, which is great news. The ball is now rolling on installation of these lines, which will provide us with dark fibre access to our existing metro network. Our network will then span five key London data centres.

In other news, we’ve been working directly with TfL to update the content on our travel notice screen in reception at NLC, which will carry over to a the new system being installed at NLE. Look out for the updated screens on-site at our facilities soon!

What’s next?

We will be continuing with progress on outstanding items throughout the holiday season, ready for larger trade work to continue in Q1. This will most notably include the electrical portion of the project – both HV and LV – which will take us right through to the point of onlining the site.

December 8, 2020December 8, 2020 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – Weeks 32 to 34

With the internal shell now complete, and with far fewer trades now on-site until the electrical works begin, we’ve been able to get various supplementary works underway across a number of key areas.

The last few weeks have proved to be an excellent springboard for getting things like access control integration started, with the first doors at NLE now online and interacting with our core systems at NLC.

Weekly overview

While final plans and schedules for the LV and HV electrical works continue, we’ve been able to press ahead on-site with a range of supplementary projects which have helped to drive forward general progress.

We’ve spent time on the main access control elements, which will secure the client entry points to the facility. This includes the frame installation of our turnstile, the integration of the main reception door onto the access control system, and the deployment of our lovely new Boon Edam speed gates.

Speedgates — The first of our three speedgate terminals fixed down to the floor in our entrance foyer, seen against the grey feature wall which runs the length of this area

Frontdoor — Here we see the front door access control systems being installed, which will also house control points for the main compound turnstile

Envelope — A quick look at some of the now fully-completed door systems, this one showing the entrance to one of our LV power rooms, and the ground floor lift entrance – this is being custom painted to match all other doors soon

Hardhat — With hard hat tours starting in early 2021, we’ve been getting the tour PPE kit on-site ready for use by our visitors

Alongside access control works, we’ve also now flood cabled the first data hall with its final lighting cables, which means we can begin to light the data halls with their overhead LED panels for the first time.

We’ve also had trades back on-site over the past few weeks to bring all doors to full completion, which includes the checking of tile stability around the frames, and adjusting all doors for their opening angles and closing speeds. Given the number of door systems installed, this is quite the undertaking.

Though not something pictured, our lift is now operational, and can move between floors. We’re now just waiting on some final integration work to be undertaken, which will bring that particular element of the project to a close.

The custom frame system we’ve had designed for our cooling plant and cold corridors arrived during this time, which we hope to begin installing in the next couple of weeks, on the lead up to Christmas.

What’s next?

Details are now finalised on much of the HV and LV front, meaning we’re close to having that stage of the project begin.

In the lead up to this, we’ll be continuing with lighting, access control, and the chequer plating of all client areas.

Another major job that will be undertaken both now and throughout the electrical installation works will be the integration of our new CREC system. This will include getting the coolers plumbed, powered and interconnected for their control systems, along with the installation of our custom-fabricated containment frame, which will blank off any cooler bays which are presently unoccupied, as well as providing a mounting location for the extraction louvres.

November 17, 2020November 17, 2020 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – Weeks 30 and 31

We’re very excited to show you another transformative fortnight of works on-site at NLE, as the internal envelope of our new data centre reaches full completion.

We’re now looking at a complete internal shell, giving us the physical structure we need to begin installing equipment and deploying electrical services.

Weekly overview

As you can see from the range of shots below, we’re now at a major turning point in this project. The internal shell has now been signed off as complete (with one final pass for minor snags pending), meaning we have the final internal structure of the building set and ready for the next phase of works that will take us into early 2021.

The facility is now presented with immaculate, high specification white spaces for all technical deployments, as well as our usual top tier front of house amenities, something our clients continue to take great advantage of at our London Central data centre.

Floor — A look at the flooring in Data Hall 3 as it moves across the space, towards completion

Doors — A look at the doors installed in the Build Room and Customer Breakout Area, showing a solid twin-leaf riser door set on the left, and the main room access door on the right, ajar

Equipment — Here we see a pair of UPS’s and their associated battery enclosures, along with a set of core network racks, which are being held in one of our LV rooms – with temporary dust bags / wraps still in place

Coolers — Here we see four CRECs in place on their custom plinths in Data Hall 1, which will cool the opening phase of this space, to be followed by a further four units when required

Exterior — A night time exterior shot, taken from the front compound, looking towards our warehouse and loading bay

As you can see in some of the shots of our new doors above, we’re using a fully integrated Paxton system, with the card readers forming part of the handle assembly. This not only keeps our facility access installation as neat and as clean as possible, but will also massively improve the time to onlining the system, as these readers operate wirelessly.

We’ve also been working on some addition access infrastructure, including our main entrance turnstile, and the pedestrian access gates which lead from reception into the technical side of the facility; more on this next time.

All of our lighting cable specifications are now with our manufacturer, who are going to be assembling these for us for compatibility with our Klik system. These are all being made to length, using the specialist Klik hardware, which will enable rapid installation to the overhead grid once it all arrives on-site. This will allow us to light all rooms using the overhead LED panels, and allow for the removal of all temporary site lighting.

We’re incredibly excited to have reached this point, as we now begin what will be the most critical phase of technical works – preparing to properly energise the facility. This is still a little way off of course, however we are now moving into the set of works that will enable this to happen.

What else has been happening?

After a lengthy wait while we got everything just right, we’re now also in a position to tease our new van, which will be the first of our new fleet – aptly named ‘001’.

Van — The side of our van features both our main logo, as well as an oversized matt finish logomark as an abstract background

Van — The rear of the van features a full Chapter 8 chevron kit, as well as more detailing on the door panels – amber light bar still to follow

This, coupled with our custom flight cases, makes inter-facility migrations and new deployments an absolute breeze.

Since our last instalment of the build blog, we’ve also seen new restrictions come into play with regards to the national response to COVID-19. We are of course following these guidelines closely, as we did during the first set of restrictions earlier this year, and will continue to do so.

As a result, we’ve now implemented Test and Trace QR codes at both of our sites, which should be used during normal check in procedures. This helps us to keep everyone safe, and to keep our facilities running without a hitch 24×7, as your businesses rely more heavily than ever before on remote services held within data centres.

What’s next?

With the envelope now complete, we will be moving onto electrical works in the very near future. This includes both internal LV work, and external HV work.

On the lead up to this next phase beginning, we will be undertaking a wide range of tasks to bring other aspects of the project either to completion, or to a stage that makes their completion post-electrical works much more straight forward.