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FIFA World Cup Games Under a Palram Polycarbonate Roof

Posted in Construction & Architecture
FIFA World Cup Games Under a Palram Polycarbonate Roof
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By Tamir Horesh

Are you a soccer fan getting ready for the World Cup 2018 action in Russia, starting this June? Even if you’re not a regular follower of the sport, you will surely not miss the buzz around the greatest sports tournament in the world. Thirty-two of the world’s best teams will compete for nearly five weeks in eleven host cities and billions of sports fans around the world will share the excitement. Most of them on the screen at home, and the lucky ones will be in Russia to experience the matches first hand.

Like in previous FIFA World Cup tournaments, Palram will participate in Russia 2018. Not on the playing field, but on the roof above the heads of players and spectators. In fact, the Palram Projects team put a great effort in 2017 to design and produce a winning solution, which will be ready in time for the opening ceremony. Our star player is not Messi or Ronaldo. It is Sunpal, a multiwall standing seam polycarbonate system.

Palram’s Sunpal system was chosen for two of the World Cup venues: the Nizhny Novgorod Stadium in the city bearing the same name, and the Mordovia Arena in the city of Saransk. Both cities are located east of Moscow. The capacity of each stadium is approximately 45,000 spectators and they are built according to the highest standards, as required by FIFA. 

When the designers of the Nizhny Novgorod Stadium approached Palram, they requested a roofing solution that would withstand extreme wind and snow conditions. The team in Russia had already met a few suppliers, and none of them was able to meet the load requirements, in addition to other requirements such as light transmission and water tightness. Palram’s engineers took the challenge and designed special aluminum profiles that would hold the polycarbonate so tightly, that even the worst of the Russian storms would not cause the sheets to loosen. A special mockup was installed in Palram’s testing facility, and a team of Russian engineers arrived to personally supervise the load simulation test.

After passing the test, Palram’s technologists created sheets in three distinct colors according to the designer’s unique vision for the roof: of a bluish whirlpool pattern. During production, each sheet had to be carefully labelled and neighbor sheets had to be grouped together, so that the installers on site would easily lift each pallet to the correct section of the roof.

The designers of the Mordovia Arena in Saransk requested to achieve maximum light transmission through the polycarbonate roof, in order to provide plenty of light for the grass, as well as to provide natural daylight to the spectators, while protecting them from the rain. Palram’s clear Sunpal was the perfect solution.

When watching the games this summer, don’t forget to look up towards the roof, and enjoy the view of Sunpal. And for those lucky ones who will visit the two beautiful venues in Nizhny Novgorod and Saransk, you will certainly enjoy the natural light and the simple beauty of Palram’s roof solution. And the games too, of course.

In the group stage, the Nizhny Stadium will host Sweden vs. South Korea, Argentina vs. Croatia, England vs. Panama, and Switzerland vs. Costa Rica. It will later host a game in the round of sixteen, and one in the quarter finals.

The Arena in Saransk will host Peru vs. Denmark, Colombia vs. Japan, Iran vs. Portugal, and Panama vs. Tunisia.