Old Mineral House is an old building at 2 Edward Street in the Brisbane CBD, with a rendered facade, arched windows and a deep cornice line. We installed the height safety system on it, cleaned the glass and washed the facade off that system, and have certified it every year since.
There was nothing to hang off when we started. The building had no compliant anchor system, so the first job was not cleaning. It was putting in something a technician could safely work from, on a building that was never designed for it.
At a glance
Location
Brisbane CBD
Services
Height safety installation, window cleaning, facade cleaning, anchor certification
Access
Rope access, off the anchors we installed
Frequency
Anchors certified annually since 2024
Photos
On site
Height safety
Twenty four anchors, and not one through the roof
The roof is metal. Putting anchor points through it means putting holes in it, and holes in a metal roof leak eventually no matter how well they are sealed. So the anchors went into the brick walls at roof level instead, bolting through the wall and picking up structure inside the plant room and roof areas. Twenty four concrete mounted abseil eyebolts in all.
What the install covered
Supply and install every asset to the manufacturer specifications and the Australian Standards
Visually inspect the lot once in, then load test every chemical and friction set anchor to AS/NZS 1891.4 and AS/NZS 4488.2
Tag each component, produce an installation report asset by asset, and affix the compliance signage
A height safety compliance certificate valid for twelve months from the day it went in
Certified every year since
The system has been inspected and recertified annually since installation, most recently in July 2026. Nine hours covers the building: every asset visually checked, every anchor load tested, every tag replaced with a current one.
It is the same crew that uses the system, which is the point of doing both. Nobody signs off an anchor they would not hang from the next morning.
Glass and facade
Cleaning an old facade off a new system
With the anchors in, the building could finally be worked properly. Ninety hours of rope access took the glass and the facade back. Inaccessible shell glass and frames finished to a streak free standard, then the render, slab edges, ledges, soffits, metal sunshades, fins and screens washed down. The awning over the restaurant at street level was done at the same time.
On the clean
All inaccessible exterior glass and frames, finished streak free rather than just rinsed off
Painted concrete and rendered walls, slab edges, ledges and soffits taken back to the drip edge
Metal sunshades, fins, screens and architectural elements washed with the surfaces around them
Arched window heads, cornices and mouldings, which hold more dirt than flat wall ever does
The awning over the ground floor restaurant, cleaned from the rope above it
The wall that would not take an anchor
One section of facade sits below the plant room wall, and that wall was not suitable for anchor points. Rather than force something into it, we rigged a double tensioned line off the anchors and structure either side and worked that section from it.
It cost twelve extra hours and it was quoted before it happened. The alternative was drilling into a wall that was not rated for it, which is not a saving, it is a liability with a delay on it.
How we get to it
A street, a footpath and a restaurant underneath
Edward Street runs right along the building and the footpath is busy all day. Every drop that comes down to street level is worked over people, traffic and a restaurant entrance, so the ground gets managed as carefully as the rope does.
On the ground
Signage, bollards and traffic control out before anyone leaves the roof, and an exclusion zone under every active line.
Drops planned so the entrance and the footpath are never closed for longer than the work in front of them actually takes.
How we leave it
Tools tethered on every drop, because the footpath is directly underneath
Water and runoff managed so nothing ends up across the entrance or the street
Equipment, bollards and signage packed away where management has approved
Keys and roof access returned, and every access door locked before anyone leaves
The building manager spoken to at the end of each day rather than at the end of the job
Photos uploaded the same day, so the record exists whether or not anyone asks for it
Challenges
What makes this one awkward
The building is old and the systems are new, and getting one onto the other without damaging it is most of the job.
A metal roof will not take penetrations, so the anchors had to go somewhere else and still be rated. The brick walls at roof level took them, bolted through and picking up structure inside. One wall would not take anything at all, so that elevation gets worked off a tensioned line instead.
The rest is the facade itself. Cornices, mouldings and arched heads hold dirt in a way flat cladding does not, and none of it can be blasted clean. It is slower work and the hours reflect it.
Outcome
What the building gets
A compliant anchor system the building did not have before, installed without a single hole in the roof, with a certificate that gets renewed every year rather than lapsing quietly until someone needs it.
And a facade that can be cleaned at all. Before the anchors went in, the ways onto this building were expensive, disruptive or simply not available. Now it is a rope job, booked when it suits the building.
