Construction Methods

The materials

In earthquake prone regions, the most crucial
factor of the reinforced concrete building’s
strength is the reinforcement placed inside its
structural frame.

As a rule, in an already built structure the load
bearing frame is not visible. Also, during its
con-struction phase only the structural
members are visible and the placed
reinforcement, which is the strength’s decisive
factor in earthquake resistant structures,
cannot be directly inspected. That factor, which
is the most crucial of all, is thoroughly
discussed in this chapter. Moreover the
ancillary equipment and the materials needed
for the combination of concrete and reinforce-
ment in order to form the structural frame are
also discussed.

The concrete is originally produced as a liquid
mixture and can be casted into different shaped
moulds. When these moulds are made out of
timber, as they usually are, they are referred to
as formworks.

In order to secure the reinforcement bars’
position inside the formwork, additional
supports are needed. These are called spacers.
They prevent the displacement of reinforcement
during the casting process and they get
incorporated inside the concrete’s mass.

concrete is a good heat conductor
and since the structural frame has a large
amount of mass, it critically affects the
building’s thermal-energy efficiency behavior;
therefore the struc-tural frame has to be
insulated.