Plant Room Strip Out Edinburgh

Sites

Live buildings

Hospitals, universities, data centres

Coverage

Edinburgh

EH postcodes

Quotes

Same day

For most enquiries

Overview

Plant room strip out in Edinburgh and across the Lothians

Edinburgh strip outs come to us from health buildings, teaching and lab buildings, offices in the centre and energy centres on industrial sites. We break out the old boilers, calorifiers, chillers, air handling sets, pumps, tanks, generators and switchgear, take them away and land the replacements, Georgian basement or Gyle roof.

We work across Edinburgh and Leith, Sighthill, South Gyle, Musselburgh, Dalkeith and Livingston, and over into Fife. A plant list and photographs tracing the way out to a street clear of bus lanes usually get the desktop survey and price back the same working day. A lot of the work goes into evenings, weekends or a shutdown because the building stays in use.

What a strip out covers

The old mechanical and electrical plant is reduced to pieces the route can take, rigged out and cleared from site, and the replacement comes back along the same route onto its bases. Your M&E contractor holds the programme and we book to it, with the pipework, the electrical work and the commissioning in their scope.

What we do

What comes out of an Edinburgh plant room

Plant	Where it sits	How it comes out
Chillers and condensers	Roof plinths and compounds	Lifted clear whole where the crane can stand, or reduced on the deck
Air handling units	Roof decks and internal rooms	Unbolted back to fan sections, coils and panels
Boilers and calorifiers	Below-ground plant rooms	Burner, casing and insulation off, shell parted into sections
Pump sets, tanks and pressure units	Tank rooms and risers	Toe-jacked off the plinth and rolled to the opening
Generators, transformers and switchgear	Energy centres and switchrooms	Slid onto skates and drawn out under a low-headroom gantry
Redundant pipework and support steel	Overhead and up the risers	Slung, then cold cut to lengths that turn the corners

We plan the job around whichever unit is worst to get out. The weight comes second. There is more on our plant room strip out service page.

Get a quote

Tell us about your project

Send us the details and we will come back with a quote, usually the same day for a desktop survey.

Or call 0131 608 0165

Sectors

Where we work in and around Edinburgh

The work splits roughly by part of the city.

Under the Old and New Towns

Boilers, calorifiers and standby sets come up out of central basements, and chillers come off the roofs above them. Tenants stay put, so heavy moves go in the evening. See our HVAC page.

Chiller and generator changes out at South Gyle and Sighthill

Rooftop chillers, standby sets and air handling units come off the business parks and trade estates on this side of the city, where there is yard room to lay the old unit down. See our industrial sector page.

Teaching, college and laboratory buildings

Air handling plant, chillers and laboratory services leave the teaching and research estate in the holidays, and the day students return closes it. See our education page.

Health buildings across the Lothians

Boiler plant, chillers and air handling units change over in buildings that never shut, so the new set is proven before the old one is broken down. See our healthcare and pharma page.

Leith, Granton and over the Forth

Compressor rooms, heating plant and standby generators leave the sheds around the docks between cargo movements, and Fife manufacturing buildings give up energy centre plant inside a planned shutdown. See our maritime page.

Planning

Access and planning for an Edinburgh plant room strip out

An Edinburgh strip out is priced once these are answered:

How far each unit is taken down. Boilers part at their sections, air handling units at their panel joints. How far down each goes fixes the heaviest piece, and whether a crane comes.
A building that keeps working. We agree hours and noise with the building manager, book a lift out for our use and board a route past the occupiers.
Vaults, rock and made ground. A skated load sits hard on a few small points. Central floors sit over vaulted cellars in one street and on rock in the next, and the waterfront is made ground, so the slab is proved.
Crane from the street, or down the stairs. A crane reaching roof plant buys a machine and a closure for the day. Inside, the same unit buys lift time, floor boarding and extra shifts.
Street space and somewhere to lay the plant down. Setts, gradients and bus lanes narrow the options in the centre, so the traffic management and road closure goes through the City of Edinburgh Council, or the West Lothian, Midlothian, East Lothian or Fife council beyond it.

Preparation

Before anything is lifted

Other trades sign off three things before we cut. Your M&E contractor takes the plant out of service, runs it dry and fits the locks, then confirms it on paper. Refrigerant comes out under an F-gas certified engineer, who certifies the recovery. If the asbestos survey done ahead of the works finds anything, a licensed contractor clears the room and certifies it.

The quote dates each one ahead of ours and says who covers it, so our crew arrives to a room it can start on.

Coverage

Postcodes and areas we cover

We cover every EH postcode, the Lothian districts and the towns beyond:

Edinburgh: Old Town, New Town, Stockbridge, Leith, Granton, Newhaven and Portobello
South and west: Marchmont, Newington, Morningside, Corstorphine, Sighthill, South Gyle and Liberton
The Lothians: Musselburgh, Dalkeith, Tranent, Penicuik, Kirkliston and Livingston
Wider area: Bathgate, Falkirk, Dunfermline, Kirkcaldy, Haddington and Galashiels

We strip out plant rooms right across the UK.

Why Synergy

Why Edinburgh firms choose Synergy Lifting for plant room strip out

Buildings that stay in use. Health, teaching and office buildings across the Lothians keep going while the plant comes out, on hours the estates team sets.
The method settled before the price. The way out and the split points are fixed at survey, so the price holds when the crew arrives.
Crane and rigging crew from one contractor. The machine on the street and the crew in the plant room are ours, and the same team takes the old plant away and lands the new one.
Qualified and accredited. CPCS and NPORS operators, lifts planned to BS 7121, equipment inspected under LOLER and PUWER, SSIP approved, Constructionline Gold Member, certified to ISO 9001 and ISO 14001, and members of the Construction Plant-hire Association.

Services

More than plant room strip out

Work that runs alongside an Edinburgh strip out:

Process

How a plant room strip out works

Give us the plant list, floor and replacement, with photographs of the route out, closes and area steps included.
At the survey we decide the way out and how far each unit is taken down.
Next comes the risk-assessed method statement and lift plan, allowing for setts and vaults, with our dates after the isolations.
The plant is stripped, rigged along the route and loaded away on our wagons.
The replacement is set down level, and the M&E contractor connects it once the Edinburgh closure is lifted.

FAQs

Common questions

Our New Town plant room is a basement with no lorry access. How does the boiler get out?

It comes up to the nearest point a wagon can hold, in pieces sized for the stair or area steps. The approach is measured at survey and the sections cut to suit.

Can a college strip out in Midlothian finish inside a holiday break?

The survey answers that, working back from the reopening date. We say before you commit whether the break covers the removal and the new plant going in.

Can the building stay open while the plant comes out?

Usually, yes. Most of this work happens in buildings that keep running, so the route is protected, the hours are agreed with the building manager, and the heavy moves go at night or over a weekend where that suits everyone. On a heating or cooling system the building cannot lose, the new plant goes in and is proven before the old plant comes out.

Who isolates and drains the plant before you start?

Your M&E contractor, with the isolation, drain down and lock-off signed off in writing before we cut anything. Refrigerant recovery belongs to an F-gas certified engineer and asbestos to a licensed contractor, so we plan our dates around both. We agree at quoting stage who is covering what.