BEHAVIOUR OF CONTINUOUS FERROCEMENT NORTHLIGHT FOLDED PLATES

Abstract

Ferrocement has been recognised as a material suited for housing construction in developing countries, because of its lighter weight, ease of construction, economy of materials, architectural flexibility and better utilisation of human resources. The major problem in the developing countries is the cheaper roofing units for Houses, Industries and Workshops etc. Extensive work on prefabrication elements used for houses has been done, but particularly Industrial roofing units are devoid of this type of construction. Adoption of prefabricated components in the construction of Industries leads to a product with better finish, strength and quality. The materials are efficiently utilised and enormous time and money savings are obtained. One such item is the precast ferrocement Northlight folded plate roof which can be used extensively in the construction of industries as a flooring system. Therefore the possible use of ferrocement folded plate for Industries should be studied. The study presents the results of an experimental investigation and analysis based on Simpson method. The behaviour of ferrocement folded plate roof elements is tested in flexure. Tests have been conducted on two specimens, which have a total effective span of 10 meter with a central support in the middle of the span. The effective width of one element is 1.3 m and thickness 20 mm. Between two adjacent plates a 30 cm gap is provided for glazing throughout the span. Tests have been conducted on continuous ferrocement' Northlight folded plate specimen subjected to an increasing uniformly distributed load up to 4 kN/m2. The experimental results correlate well with the theoretical results. It is recommended that a load factor of at least 1.45 may be used for ferrocement Northlight folded plate. Ferrocement Northlight folded plate roofs are 25% to 28% economical as compared to steel roof truss covered with G.I. sheets and R.C.C. roof slab depending upon the plan area covered. Hence it proves the economic viability of ferrocement Northlight folded plates.