EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF WIND LOADS ON HOARDINGS

Abstract

A hoarding which is mostly susceptible to wind loads usually fails in turbulent wind conditions if not designed properly. This structure also adds a place of importance to study because in current situation most of the market places laden with too many hoardings and roads also contain several signage. The aim of present study is to carry out extensive wind tunnel test on rigid models of hoardings with various aspect ratios and permeability configuration for evaluating force coefficients and pressure measurement on hoarding model. To carry out research work five rigid models and five models with different permeability of hoarding are used which are made of plywood. These hoarding models are used for force measurements and other is made of perspex sheet which is used for pressure measurement. The hoarding models are made in the geometrical model scale ratio of 1:10. The models are tested under the boundary layer flow in an open circuit wind tunnel with a cross-section of-1 m (width) x 2 m (height) and the length of the section as 15 in, Floor roughing devices namely vortex generators, barrier wall, cubical blocks of size 150 mm, 100 mm and 50 mm are used on the upstream end of the test sections to achieve the mean wind velocity profile corresponding to terrain category 2 as per indian standard on wind loads. Various instruments are also used along with the data acquisition system for the base force measurement. The present report described the details about the model used, testing procedure and important conclusions drawn from the study. It is observed that both base shear and base moments developed due to wind loads are not only influenced by wind directions, but these are also highly affected by aspect ratios and permeability. The area of research in this report is to study wind loads on hoardings with various aspect ratios and permeability. The research contains experiment analysis of the various hoarding models with varying permeability while keeping the projected area same in Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel. This report describes various alterations in the aspect ratio and permeability of hoarding and the wind load effect on these changes. The research work also help us to guide to choose for suitable changes in hoardings which should be incorporated in the design so it will economize in terms of wind loads giving structural engineers a better design opportunity.