UK Housing Wiki

We have a discord server!

If you are able to, when editing a page that doesn't have the info box, please add the infobox. You can find the information needed to edit our wiki on https://www.towerblock.eca.ed.ac.uk/

READ MORE

UK Housing Wiki
Advertisement

Truscon (also known by the company's full name Trussed Concrete Steel Company) was a construction company established in London by Moritz Kahn in 1907 to bring Americanised construction techniques in reinforced concrete to Great Britain. The technique had actually been devised by Moritz's brother, Julius Kahn, in Detroit in 1903 and was being employed by their brother architect Albert Kahn for new buildings in the United States.

Truscon was based in London and opened a works at Trafford Park in 1912-13. The initial application of this form of construction was in industrial buildings, and by 1920, the company claimed that 90% of multi-storey industrial buildings were being built using reinforced concrete. The construction technique allowed for the design and construction of buildings with larger floorplates yet with larger wall openings for windows, allowing deeper natural light penetration. This was made possible through the development of steel reinforcement bars patented by the company that produced a higher strength of reinforced concrete than other competitors, that made it particular suitable for factories where the floors would undergo regular loading and unloading. The earliest surviving example of a Truscon-framed building in the UK is the Birmingham Small Arms factory in Birmingham - although much of the appearance has now been altered.

Following World War II, the advantages of the Truscon technique in multi-storey residential construction were marketed by the company and became particularly popular. Truscon themselves would not construct the buildings, rather using local contractors to carry out construction to the specified design with all necessary components used in the building process supplied by Truscon. It found particular popularity in tower block and mass complex construction, although the economic advantages of other construction techniques such as Bison would eclipse the popularity of Truscon.

Advertisement