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Seismic Behavior of Point Supported Glas
Seismic Behavior of Point Supported Glas
Seismic Behavior of Point Supported Glas
Due to its transparency today’s architectures often rely on glazed façade solutions
to execute the building envelope. During a seismic event, glass breakage and fall
out can occur and threaten occupants and passers. So in earthquake prone regions
this must be accounted in the design project; however, there is little research on the
behaviour of glazed façades under seismic loads. This papers focus on the results of
a project under development to ascertain right well dimensioned and adequate
solutions to glass facades using point fixing systems under seismic or wind actions.
Numerical analyses were performed, using finite element commercial software, the
results are compared with simplified methods and conclusion are drawn.
Keywords: spider glass, glass façade seismic behaviour, curtain wall glass façade
1. Introduction
Recent developments in science and technology allowed glass to be used in several
structural demanding applications such as façades, roofs, girders and columns, etc.
Due to glass’ brittle behaviour this calls for more refined analysis methods and greater
design detailing to ensure structural stability and safety.
Currently modern facade buildings rely on glazed curtain wall systems. These systems
include either singular aluminium alloy frame glass curtain walls or frameless glass
curtain walls. This is the case of the so called spider fixing systems, which are pointed
supported.
Although there are some research on the behaviour of glass panels under out-of-plane
loads, e.g., wind loads, the combine effect of both in-plane and out-of plane loads that
are applied to the panels in an earthquake is a field of research still on its early stages.
In fact, seismic action brings out specific problems to designers, due to the lack of, at
least well-known, international rules or regulations about this problem.
The scope of this paper is to present the relevant aspects of the seismic loading in point
fixed glass panels. Firstly a simplified method based upon the elastic response spectrum
is introduced, then the results of a time history dynamic analyses are presented.
Challenging Glass 3
Figure 1: Schematic of displacement time history for dynamic crescendo test [2].
Seismic Behavior of Point Supported Glass Panels
6
4
2
0
0 1 2 3 4
T (s)
Sa
Thus the dynamic load transmitted to the façade panels (equation 1) depends on the
building’s natural vibration period and on the panel’s mass and natural vibration period.
0.40 C fZ S DS E M E
FEk (1)
RE
where,
FEk characteristic seismic force;
CfZ seismic coefficient of the panel (depends on the building dynamic
characteristics and the position on the panel in the building);
SDS ground acceleration value;
γE importance coefficients of the panel (ranging between 1.0 and 1.5);
ME panel’s mass;
RE coefficient of performance of the panel (ranging between 1.5 and 3.5).
Prior to the application of the simplified method a parametric analysis was made to
evaluate the variation of seismic coefficient CfZ with the dynamic properties of the panel
and its position or height in the building. Two different cases were studied: in the first
case the panel is assumed to be in the last floor (m=N), and in the second, the panel was
assumed to be in placed at the penultimate floor (m=N-1). Figure 3 and Figure 4
presents the variation of Cfz with the natural period of vibration of the building for
different values of the natural period of vibration for the glass panel.
Challenging Glass 3
40 Tpanel=0.4s
20 Tpanel=0.6s
0 Tpanel=0.8s
0 1 2 3 4
Tpanel=1s
T (s)
The results (Figure 3 and Figure 4) shows a very significant resonant effect for low
periods and a comparison between them allow to conclude that a panel in the last floor
corresponds to the most severe situation in what seismic excitation concern, with values
about 40% higher, once the coefficient, CfZ is directly correlated with the maximum
seismic force acting in the panel.
4. Case study
International Fair in Zaragoza or the glass roof of the Metro Station at Sá Carneiro
Airport in Porto.
On the basis of this work is the newly-built office building of Bouygues Imobiliária in
Lisbon. A particular attention was given to the safety requirements of a 20 meters high
point-supported glass façade over the main entrance of the building. The post-breakage
behaviour of the laminated safety glass panels is the primary concern. This is often a
neglected problem in glass façades yet of greater importance since Lisbon as many
other metropolis is prone to seismic activity.
A crucial concern on this matter is essential: The integrity of the glass façade must be
preserved and assured that there’s no risk of glass fragments fallings.
Among the various enhancement solutions the use of laminated safety glass with the
DuPont interlayer SentryGlas® provides an optimal behaviour due to its excellent post-
breakage performance with the glass fragments remaining adhered to the interlayer,
without falling down.
Figure 6: Geoometrical configuuration of the glasss panels: left) V11 and V2; right) V3,
V V4 and V5 (D
Drawings by:
FACAL).
The panelss identified ass V1, V2, V33 and V4 are obtained fro om 10 mm strrengthened
glass and a 1.52mm thicck interlayer toogether with a 8mm also teempered glasss.Panel V5
is made froom two 12mm m tempered glaass sheets.
Panels V1 and V3 havee a SentryGlaass® film whhile the remaiining panels have h PVB
interlayer. Furthermore a panel with the same geoometrical conffiguration of that t of V5
but with SeentryGlass® innterlayer film
m was additional considered in the analysees.
The properrties of the thhe PVB’s Youung modulus ranges from 3.2 3 MPa to 18 MPa [9,
10], so in the
t panels withh this type off interlayer thrree different values
v for this parameter
were conssidered: (i) 3.2MPa,
3 (ii) 9.0 MPa annd (iii) 18.0 MPa. In thee case of
SentryGlass® a the valuee of 300 MPa was adopted for its Young g modulus, as suggested
by Delincé [10].
Table 1summmarises the relevant
r data for
f the the studdied glass pan nels.
4.3. FE model
To evaluate the structural response of the glass panels a set of numerical models were
made using commercial finite element (FE) software.
The glass panels and interlayer film were modelled with 8-node 3D finite elements. In
the interior of the panel the maximum size of the finite elements was limited to 2
centimetres, while near the supports the maximum size was reduced to half to attend the
stress concentrations near the holes to take in account the expected stress concentrations
in this regions.
Figure 7: FE mesh details - a) lateral view; b) interior of the panel; c) support region.
The degrees of Freedom (DOF) restrictions which enabled this stress concentration near
the support region and the brittle nature glass leads to a several numerical model
simulations stages until a solution that that correctly represent the real support condition
was achieved.
To assess the behaviour of the model two premises were advanced: (i) the allowance for
rotations of the panel according the real behaviour; (ii) Stress distribution around the
hole should be compatible with reality.
The best solution lead to the implementation of an external node where the support
constraints are included. The connection to the panel was provided throughout rigid
pseudo beam elements (Figure 8).
Challenging Glass 3
5. Results
20
FEk (kN) 10
0
0 1 2
Τ (s)
As it can be observed, the peak values presented in the figure, nearly 10 times the
panel’s self weight, confirm the expected resonant effects in the panels.
2
üg (m/s2)
-2
-4
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time (s)
Ground acceleration
To verify the existence of resonant effects in the panel a structure with a natural period
of 0.12 s (very close to the natural period of that of panel V5(i)) was analysed with the
selected ground motion record. The floor accelerations obtained, Figure 12, were then
applied to the façade panel and the corresponding response was gathered, Figure 13.
Challenging Glass 3
Floor accelerations
10
Acceleration (m/s2)
5
-5
-10
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time(s)
Floor accelerations
50
-50
-100
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time (s)
Panel acceleration
The maximum response acceleration of the panel, about 81 m/s2, 10 times the peak floor
acceleration, confirms the existence of resonance in the façade panel.
As the simplified method does not consider any damping effects, new dynamic analyses
were made considering the panel’s damping ratio (ξ) ranging from 0% to 5%.
Table 3: Differences in the panel V5(i) response for different damping ratio.
Table 3 shows that there is a decay of almost 30% in the maximum deflection when a
2% damping ratio was considered.
Thus in buildings with natural vibration frequencies that might induce resonance in the
façade panels an energy dissipation device should be applied to reduce the dynamic
response of the panel.
Seismic Behavior of Point Supported Glass Panels
500
400
300
200
100
0
0 5 10 15 20 25
drift (mm)
The low drift level that causes material failure determined by the numerical test lead to
the formulation of the hypothesis that AAMA 501.6 dynamic test aims to determine the
maximum drift that causes panel’s detachment from the support rather than the material
rupture.
6. General conclusions
In a FEM analysis the importance of an adequate modelling of the support conditions in
the point supported glass panels is mandatory in order to control the stress concentration
phenomenon.
The simplified method to determine the seismic forces transmitted to façade panels
seems to be able to capture the relevant aspects of the whole issue regarding resonance
effects as well.
The numerical simulations using time history analysis confirmed the hypothesis of
resonance effects induced by the building’s natural frequency and are in agreement with
the peak values determined by the simplified method.
Challenging Glass 3
7. References
[1] Sucuoǧlu, H. and C.V.G. Vallabhan, Behaviour of window glass panels during earthquakes.
Engineering Structures, 1997. 19(8): p. 685-694.
[2] AAMA, AAMA 501.6-09: Recommended dynamic test method for determining the seismic drift causing
glass fallout from a wall system. 2009, AAMA.
[3] AAMA, AAMA 501.4-09: Recommended static testing method for evaluating curtain wall and storefront
systems subjected to seismic and wind induced interstory drift. 2009, AAMA.
[4] Memari, A.M., R.A. Behr, and P.A. Kremer, Seismic behavior of curtain walls containing insulating
glass units. Journal of Architectural Engineering, 2003. 9(2): p. 70-85.
[5] Camposinhos, R.d.S., Revestimentos em pedra natural com fixação mecânica dimensionamento e
projecto. 2009, Lisboa: Edições Sílabo. 199 ISBN 978-972-618-561-1.
[6] Singh, M.P., et al., Seismic design forces. I: Rigid nonstructural components. Journal of Structural
Engineering, 2006. 132(10): p. 1524-1532.
[7] Singh, M.P., et al., Seismic design forces. II: Flexible nonstructural components. Journal of Structural
Engineering, 2006. 132(10): p. 1533-1542.
[8] CEN, Eurocode 8 - Design of structures for earthquake resistance Part1: General rules, seismic actions
and rules for buildings. 2010, IPQ: Caparica. p. 230.
[9] Chen, J., Q. Zhang, and B. Xie, Nonlinear finite element analysis on laminated glass panel based on
APDL. Computer Aided Engineering, 2010. 19(Copyright 2011, The Institution of Engineering and
Technology): p. 22-6.
[10] Delincé, D., et al. Post-breakage behaviour of laminated glass in structural applications. in Challenging
Glass. 2008.
[11] http://www.vibrationdata.com/elcentro.htm. Access Date: 18/05/2011