Enclosures for building services
& smart buildings

One building, three enclosure worlds

Modern building services are spread over three levels: power distribution (main LV switchboard, sub-distribution boards), automation (BMS control centres, I&C controllers, room automation) and, increasingly, the building network (switches, access points, servers for access control and video). ZPAS covers all three — with SZE floor-standing enclosures and SWN wall-mounted enclosures for distribution and I&C, Z-BOX/Z-CUBE 19″ wall-mounted distributors for the floors and SJB network cabinets for the technical room.

For special cases there is stainless steel (underground car park, swimming pool — stainless steel enclosures) and outdoor variants for equipment on the roof or in outdoor areas.

Typical applications

Requirements — clearly classified

Standards in building services

Distribution boards in buildings are low-voltage switchgear assemblies to IEC 61439 on empty enclosures to IEC 62208 — installed by the electrical contractor according to the rules of DIN VDE 0100. For the choice of enclosure, the degree of protection to EN 60529 matters most: IP 54 for plant rooms, IP 65 for damp and wash areas such as the underground car park, IP 54/55 for the roof — the IP overview helps with classification.

The IT side of the building follows the 19-inch world (IEC 60297): floor distributors, BMS servers and network equipment share the same rack standard — from the compact wall-mounted distributor to the floor-standing cabinet in the server room.

Which enclosure for which location in the building?

Typical project: office building from basement to roof

Starting point: a new six-storey building needs a network distributor on each floor, a BMS control centre in the technical room, distribution boards in the underground car park — and a weatherproof enclosure on the roof for the outdoor equipment. Four environments, four requirement profiles, one deadline.

The solution from a single catalogue: Z-BOX wall-mounted distributors on the floors, SZE enclosures for main distribution and BMS, SWN IP 65 in the underground car park, a double-walled SZD on the roof. One supplier, one set of documentation, wired at the factory on request — and the electrical and IT trades work from the same set of drawings.

Smart building: when BMS and IT grow together

Modern building management systems speak IP — DDC controllers, gateways and switches end up in the same room as the network equipment. In practice this means: plan 19-inch levels for the BMS too, leave reserve rack units for retrofits and document the boundary between electrical and IT distribution cleanly on each floor. Organising this early avoids a proliferation of individual enclosures in the riser shaft later on.

And in existing buildings? There, the recess dictates the size: old distribution boards give way to new ones, but masonry, riser shafts and door widths stay. Special sizes from the factory solve this more elegantly than a standard cabinet with expanding foam around it — the new distribution board is drawn to fit the existing opening, the cable routes remain, and the replacement takes place floor by floor while the building stays in operation. Drilling templates and drawings arrive before delivery so that openings and brackets are prepared before the first enclosure is even in the building — saving time on site and rounds of coordination.

Planning checklist: enclosures for building services

These points should be clarified before the tender:

• Map the locations: plant room, floors, damp and outdoor areas — define the appropriate degree of protection to EN 60529 for each location.
• Floor distributors: rack units required per floor plus reserve — wall-mounted distributors save floor space, floor-standing cabinets grow more easily.
• Access: who may access which distribution board — operator, tenant, service provider? Define locking and logging early.
• BMS/IT convergence: plan 19-inch space for DDC, gateways and switches — including patching reserve.
• Visible areas: in the office, appearance matters — plan the SJB's glass door and design options instead of a technical cabinet in the corridor.
• Documentation: one set of drawings across all trades — saves effort at acceptance and in operation.

Why ZPAS

Because building projects have many trades but little storage space: ZPAS supplies all enclosure levels from a single source, scheduled to the construction sequence — from a single distribution board to fitting out an entire building with repeat configurations per floor.