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Devil in the details

Devil in the details

A team of carpenters bring a complex design by Foster+Partners to life – with a BITURBO drill that just seems destined for the job.

Building the Acciona Ombú

Some tools just seem destined for the job. In Madrid, world-famous architects Foster+Partners are transforming a historic former gas plant into a sustainable mecca of plant and work-life. To bring the interior of the Acciona Ombú to life according to the design, a team of carpenters must take on 3,000m³ of solid timber – and interlock them at the unusual angles of 33°, 45°, and 60°. When we heard about the angled drilling, a green light flashed in our minds. We immediately sent over the one tool destined for the job: the GSR 18V-150 C Professional drill driver.

Drilling at different angles is tough work, but it's easier with our BITURBO drill driver – with Electronic Angle Detection.

Carpenter Constantin Olteanu uses the GSR 18V-150 C Professional drill driver on-site at the Acciona Ombú.

Destined for the job

MADRID – A flash of green light. A short buzz. A quick inspection. Constantin Olteanu looks up, pleased with the result. The carpenter is on-site at the Acciona Ombú, where he's busy driving 9mm-diameter, 30mm-long screws into massive blocks of timber – at the unusual angle of 33 degrees. "We're assembling a woorden structure on a project for Norman Foster," Olteanu explains. According to the architect's plans, he needs to drill holes and drive screws at 33, 45, and 60 degrees into 3,000 cubic metres of solid timber. He's just getting started and this level of detail usually means long hours ahead – but today is destined to be different thanks to the GSR 18V-150 C Professional drill driver.


Sustainable details

Olteanu and his team of carpenters are working inside the shell of a brick building that stood empty in Madrid for years. In 2017, sustainable infrastructure firm Acciona saw the potential of the former gas plant and bought it, hiring architects Foster+Partners to give a new and sustainable lease of life to their future offices. The result? Over 10,000 tonnes of reclaimed material and 1,000 tonnes of saved carbon emissions. The team will preserve the original brick exterior from 1905 while refurbishing the interior with locally sourced timber frames. When it opens in 2022, Acciona Ombú will combine the new and the old, with solid timber structures interlocking at different angles throughout the interior. A beautiful design – and tough work for carpenters.


Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter
To build these structures, we need to drill at angles of 33°, 45° and 60°. Thanks to the GSR 18V-150 C Professional's in-built angle detection, we can work faster and easier.

Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter

Electronic Angle Detection

"Working with a lot of different angles definitely takes more time," says Olteanu, an experienced carpenter. To drill at an angle, he would normally need to use extra devices: Pocket hole jigs or a scrap of wood to guide the drill bit, a speed square to gauge the angles. But today, all he has is the GSR 18V-150 C Professional. Besides boasting up to 150Nm of torque, the BITURBO drill driver comes with a game-changing feature – Electronic Angle Detection. Here's how it works: Olteanu tells the drill which angle he needs by selecting 45 or 60 degrees on the tool. The in-built sensor then waits for him to position the drill bit at the correct angle. When the LED light flashes green, he pulls the trigger.


Every possible angle

According to the design, Olteanu needs to drill multiple holes at 33 degrees, which is not available directly on the tool. But with the GSR 18V-150 C Professional, all he needs is the Bosch Toolbox app. He opens the free app on his smartphone, scrolls through a list of angles, and taps on the one he needs. Once the custom setting is transferred to the drill driver via Bluetooth, Olteanu is back to work. Green light! Drill. Green light! Drill. With no fiddly extra devices to slow him down, a normally tough job is turning out to be fun. He's never worked this quickly with so many different angles before: "Thanks to the tool's in-built Electronic Angle Detection, angled drilling has never been faster or easier."


Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter
We need to work at elevated heights. No cables, no extension cords. That's the great thing with cordless tools. Plus I can flexibly use the same battery with different tools.

Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter

Working at height

To build the interior structures of the Acciona Ombú, Olteanu and his team spend hours working on scaffolding over 20 metres tall. "No cables, no extension cords," he says. "At these heights, we depend entirely on cordless tools and battery power." Thankfully, as part of the high-performance BITURBO series, the GSR 18V-150 C Professional drill driver delivers equivalent corded power with just one 18V battery. To unleash the drill's maximum power, Olteanu uses our high-performance ProCORE18V 8.0Ah battery, which offers longer runtimes and superior temperature management for uninterrupted work.


High user-protection

The sustainable timber frames are part of the Acciona Ombú's charm, but power-drilling natural materials comes with its own hazards. A violent kickback when the drill head snags on a knot-hole in the wood can lead to a tearing of wrist muscles, severe burns – or worse – a fatal fall. Standing high up on scaffolding inside the Acciona Ombú, Olteanu takes no risks and relies heavily on the high user-protection of the GSR 18V-150 C Professional drill driver. Thanks to an in-built sensor, the drill's motor switches off immediately upon sudden impact, lowering the risk of common kickback injuries. "If I'm standing on scaffolding and the drill twists my arm, I could fall," says Olteanu. "But thanks to the tool's KickBack Control, I feel much safer."


Constantin Olteanu, Carpenter
KickBack Control makes me feel safer, because if I'm standing on a scaffolding and the drill twists my arm, I could fall. Now the tool automatically turns off... just like that!

Constantin Olteanu, Carpenter

The timber structures inside the Acciona Ombú are over 20 metres tall and require cordless drills with corded performence.

A tool of the future

The day's almost over. Olteanu looks up at the timber structure he and his team have been building all day. Thanks to the GSR 18V-150C Professional, he's been able to work seamlessly and without compromise: The cordless BITURBO machine offers him the freedom of working without a power socket nearby and the performance of an equivalent corded drill – all with just one ProCORE18V battery. Together with its sleuth of intelligent features, the drill driver feels almost destined for the Acciona Ombú project, making the days of tough work ahead look easier and safer – and even more fun. "This really is a tool of the future," Olteanu says.


Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter
With so many features, the BITURBO GSR 18V-150 C Professional really is a high-performance tool. It's the future.

Constantin Olteanu, Acciona Ombú Carpenter

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