2 A transportable building including off-centre lifting means FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a transportable building for use in portable camps and, in particular, to a chassis for a transportable building including forklift tyne or crane cable receiving means 5 which are offset from the centre of the chassis to compensate for additional weight on one end of the building. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Camps have been used for many years to provide shelter and accommodation especially in remote areas. This is especially so in the case of remote camps that are assembled using a number of 10 transportable buildings, some of the buildings used as sleeping quarters, others as the kitchen and dining room facility and others still as recreational areas. It is not uncommon for a camp to consist of sixty to eighty buildings that can accommodate several hundred people. These camps are completely self-contained in that the transportable buildings provide all of the facilities for a small remote community that may be needed in a particular area. Accordingly these camps 15 include all of the modem day facilities such as electrical power, water, sewerage, and communication. They therefore typically also include their own power generation systems, water distribution systems, sewerage treatment plants, and communication facilities such as satellite dishes. The camps typically require a considerable amount of skill, time, and effort to assemble and commission. Once constructed, these camps can however provide accommodation indefinitely if the infrastructure is maintained. 20 In some instances the camps have to be portable or mobile. For example, during construction of infrastructure across a vast area, such as roads or pipelines supplying water or gas, a particular location for a camp housing the construction workers, may only be viable for several weeks or months. As the pipeline is progressively constructed, there is a balance between the economic cost of the travel time of workers housed in the camp to the current work site and time spent constructing the actual pipeline. It is 25 therefore accepted in the industry that if the travel time between a camp and the work location is more than an hour, a new camp has to be constructed that is closer to the work location. At that time, a new camp is therefore constructed one hour ahead of the current construction location or generally up to several hundred kilometres away from the existing camp. The present inventor is the owner of a number of patents in connection with transportable 30 buildings including Australian Letters Patent No. 2003227102, directed towards an improved transportable building chassis and its ability to be easily lifted and transported using a working vehicle such as a forklift. This enables the buildings to be transported with ease, and makes commissioning and 3 decommissioning of camps a much more fast and efficient process. The chassis includes forklift receiving means in the form of two spaced apart apertures or channels adapted to receive the forklift tynes, or crane cable apertures, at the centre of the chassis. A problem which has been recognised by the present inventor is that when more weight is placed 5 on one end of the building, for example, where a rack for supporting air conditioning and hot water units and the like is mounted on the end wall, it is difficult for a forklift operator to balance the building when transporting it. The present inventor has also recently recognised the possibility of stacking buildings one above the other in a camp. This requires a building to be raised to a height to enable it to be lowered onto the roof chassis of another building. The potential problems arising from not being able to maintain the 10 building in a balanced state are exacerbated when raising it to such heights. Not only is there a risk that the building will become damaged, there are also occupational health and safety concerns in connection with lifting a building to that height when it is not securely engaged. This applies to both the forklift operator and personnel in the vicinity. It is with these issues in mind that the transportable building of the present invention and, in particular, the chassis therefor has been conceived. 15 It is therefore an object of the present invention to overcome at least some of the abovementioned problems or provide the public with a useful alternative. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore in one form of the invention there is proposed a base chassis for a transportable building, said base chassis having off-centre lifting means to compensate for uneven distribution of 20 weight across the chassis. In preference said base chassis is rectangular and includes two elongate C-section side beams, and a plurality of transversely extending, C-section cross members, said cross members having flanges directed towards a centre of the chassis, said cross members being elevated above two longitudinally extending I-beams disposed inwardly and parallel to the elongate side beams, whereby upper flanges of 25 the C-section cross members are aligned with upper flanges of the side beams, and lower flanges of the inner I-beams are aligned with lower flanges of the side beams. Preferably said lifting means is in the form of two transversely extending, spaced apart hollow beams extending at least partially through said base chassis, said hollow beams being configured to receive spaced apart tynes of a forklift for raising the chassis. 30 In preference said lifting means also includes crane cable receiving apertures on opposed sides of the base chassis, said apertures adapted to receive crane cables for raising the chassis.
4 In a further form of the invention there is proposed a transportable building for use in a portable camp, said transportable building including a base chassis including any one of the abovementioned features. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 5 The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate several implementations of the invention and, together with the description, serve to explain the advantages and principles of the invention. In the drawings; Figure 1 illustrates a perspective view of a transportable building including off-centre forklift tyne 10 receiving means in accordance with the present invention; Figure 2 illustrates an exploded partial perspective view of the transportable building of Figure 1 including a utilities rack mounted to one end thereof; Figure 3 illustrates a perspective view of a conventional base chassis for a transportable building having forklift tyne receiving means at the centre of the chassis; 15 Figure 4 illustrates a perspective view of a base chassis of the transportable building of Figure 1 being offset to one side of the centre in accordance with the present invention; Figures Sa-5d illustrate front perspective, rear perspective, front and rar views of the transportable building of Figure 1; and Figures 6-7 illustrate progressively in perspective views a forklift being used to stack the building of 20 Figure 1 onto a second building. DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The following detailed description of the invention refers to the accompanying drawings. Although the description includes exemplary embodiments, other embodiments are possible, and changes may be made to the embodiments described without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. 25 Wherever possible, the same reference numbers will be used throughout the drawings and the following description to refer to the same and like parts. Referring to Figure 1, there is illustrated a modular transportable building 10 including a base chassis 12 configured in accordance with the present invention, the chassis being adapted to be moveable 5 using a forklift 13 or other lifting means even when the weight on one end of the chassis is greater than the other end. The transportable building 10 further includes a roof chassis 16, and a plurality of wall panels 18 defining an elongate box-shaped building having a front side 20 and a rear side 22 extending parallel to a 5 central longitudinal axis of the building, and ends 24 and 26 extending perpendicularly thereto. The modular transportable building 10 includes four internal walls which are also made up of wall panels 18 and which divide the building into four separate compartments, hence the four doors 28 on the front side 20 of the building. Of course, the geometry of the building 10 and the number of rooms may vary and it is not intended to limit the present invention to the same exact type of building. 10 Because the present invention is directed specifically to the configuration of the base chassis 12, it alone will be described in detail. Figure 2 illustrates one example of how the building 10 may gain an uneven distribution of weight, that is, by mounting a utility rack 30 together with utilities (not shown) such as an air conditioning unit and hot water system to one end of the building 10. This is a common addition to 15 transportable buildings 10 used in portable camps. The skilled addressee would realise that if the base chassis were configured as per the chassis 31 shown in Figure 3, where forklift tyne receiving means in the form of spaced apart channels 32 are positioned at the centre of the chassis 12, the uneven distribution of weight caused by the utility rack 30 and its contents would cause the building to tilt towards the utility rack end when it is lifted from the ground. Although a slight tilt when moving the building 10 using a 20 forklift may not be too much cause for concern, when raising the building high above the ground, for example to stack one building above another, such movement can pose a serious problem. If the base chassis 12 is configured as shown in Figure 4 in accordance with the present invention, where the forklift tyne receiving channels 32 are disposed from the centre of the chassis towards the heavier end of the building, the distribution of weight will become substantially even again 25 when the building is raised from the ground. It is to be understood that the building lifting means need not necessarily be limited to forklift tyne receiving channels 32. For example, it is envisaged that the chassis will also include crane cable receiving means (not shown), which will also be disposed a predetermined distance from the centre of the chassis 12 to compensate for the uneven distribution of weight. Turning to the base chassis 12 in more detail, the chassis 12 includes two longitudinal side beams 30 34 which have a substantially C-shaped cross section. The beams 34 oppose each other such that their web portions are on the outer side of the building and their flange portions point inwardly. Two further C section beams 36 are used to cap the ends of the chassis 12 by extending transversely across the ends of beams 34. The end beams 36 are configured in the opposite direction such that their flange portions point out from the chassis 12, although other configurations are possible. Extending transversely between the 6 beams 34 are a plurality of C-section cross members 38 which are elevated above two 1-beams 40 positioned inwards of beams 28. The lower flanges of the internal I-beams 40 extend in substantially the same horizontal plane as the lower flanges of the outer C-section side beams 34, thus extending directly above the ground surface. 5 As mentioned above, the base chassis 12 also includes forklift tyne receiving channels 32. In the embodiment shown, these are in the form of hollow, box-shaped beams of a flat rectangular cross-section, each beam 32 extending transversely through the outer longitudinal beams 34 as well as through the inner longitudinal I-beams 40. This configuration allows for entry into the channels 32 from both sides of the building. The upper internal surface of the beams 32 provides an abutment surface against which the ends 10 of each forklift tyne 42 presses when the building is raised, It is to be understood however that even if the beams 32 were not present, and the receiving means were simply in the form of apertures through the respective beams, the building 10 could still be carried using a forklift 13 because the ends of the forklift tynes 42 could be inserted in a way to abut instead against one of the internal structural elements. The present invention is not intended to be limited to any one particular configuration of tyne receiving 15 means. What is important is that their position is offset from the centre of the chassis 12. Figures Sa-5d illustrate the transportable building of the present invention including a base chassis 12 having off-centre forklift receiving means 32 from different views. Figures 6-7 illustrate how one building having a utility rack 30 mounted on one end thereof can still be raised to a level to be stacked above a second building, by engaging the building using a forklift at an off-centre position. 20 Obviously, the location of the lifting means along the chassis will depend on which end of the building will carry more weight, and also the weight difference between the ends. For example, if the weight difference is very minor, then obviously the present invention need not be applied. If the weight difference is enough to cause a tilt of the building and concern to the forklift operator, then the channels 32 should be offset a corresponding distance from the centre of the chassis towards the heavier end. If the 25 weight difference is considerable, then the channels 32 should be positioned even closer to the heavier end. It is envisaged that prior to manufacture of the buildings, rough estimates on the weight of one end of the building as compared to the other will be calculated, and so the position of the lifting means along the chassis 12 will be calculated accordingly. Further advantages and improvements may very well be made to the present invention without 30 deviating from its scope. Although the invention has been shown and described in what is conceived to be the most practical and preferred embodiment, it is recognized that departures may be made therefrom within the scope and spirit of the invention, which is not to be limited to the details disclosed herein but is to be accorded the full scope of the claims so as to embrace any and all equivalent devices and apparatus.
7 In any claims that follow and in the summary of the invention, except where the context requires otherwise due to express language or necessary implication, the word "comprising" is used in the sense of "including", i.e. the features specified may be associated with further features in various embodiments of the invention. 5