Dixie micro-piles provide major cost savings for amphitheatre

Providing a dramatic backdrop to performances, the Minack Theatre is a 700 seat open air amphitheatre carved into the cliff face near to Lands End. An exposed walkway running along the cliff edge, used by actors to reach the stage, needed to be upgraded, widened and new handrails installed. Piles had been specified as the means of support for the widened pathway, which was to be formed from concrete, and to tie it back into the rock face. However, the cost of the scaffolding and support structures required to enable a traditional piling system to be used would have cost many thousands of pounds. An effective but more economical method needed to be found.

The Helifix solution

The relatively lightweight Dixie micro-pile system offered the major advantage of being easily portable, enabling it to be easily carried by hand down the pedestrian walkway. This eliminated the need for extensive, elaborate and expensive scaffolding, requiring just basic scaffolding for work access and providing the client with significant cost savings.

The hand held installation drive head and the required pile sections were simply carried by hand down the pedestrian access steps carved into the rock face.

On the sloping section of the cliff where the actors’ walkway was to be widened 21 Dixie micro-piles were rapidly installed through the surface soil layer down to the rock, 11 vertically and 10 at a 45° angle to the cliff.

With the Dixie micro-piles installed the walkway was widened, with the concrete being secured to the pile heads, and the cost-effective upgrade was rapidly and efficiently completed.