Structural Evaluation of Cement Skin Sandwich Building System

The balance between sustainability and affordability is hard to achieve when considering choices of building envelopes. This paper evaluates a simple and easy-to-construct stressed skin structural sandwich system that is both affordable and sustainable. The system is composed of an expanded polystyrene (EPS) panel core, wrapped in polymer mesh and covered with a thin cement skin on both sides. This system design leads to a highly energy efficient building envelope system. A full-scale sandwich was constructed and tested to examine the possibility of its use as a load bearing wall in a one story residential house without traditional timber frames. Based on the requirements imposed by the National Building Code (NBC), the test results from this experimental program were found promising. The wall carried a gravity load, a wind load and seismic in-plane shear load at least 4 times as high as the NBD design load with negligible lateral displacement and no visible cracking. At buckling failure, the load-carrying capacity of the wall exceeded 10 times the design load. The EPS-core stressed-cement skin sandwich building system thus provides a good example of the use of thin cementitious products in load bearing exterior wall structural applications.

• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/isbn/087031159X
• Corporate Authors:

  American Concrete Institute (ACI)

  38800 Country Club Drive
  Farmington Hills, MI  United States  48331
• Authors:
  • Robinson, B
  • Blain-Cosgrove, E
  • Shao, Y
• Publication Date: 2004

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Print
• Features: Figures; References;
• Pagination: pp 101-112
• Monograph Title: Thin Reinforced Cement-Based Products and Construction Systems

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Building materials; Cement; Design load; Gravity; Polystyrene; Sandwich construction; Seismicity; Structural analysis; Structural design; Thinness; Walls; Wind resistant design
• Subject Areas: Highways; Materials; I32: Concrete;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01000607
• Record Type: Publication
• ISBN: 087031159X
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: May 23 2005 11:15AM