ULTRAPERFORMING Beams/ Columns Doors ... - fen-om data

Biopaver
Every parking lot, driveway, sidewalk and road is an impervious surface acting as an unbroken
barrier between the wet rain falling from the sky and the dry earth below. Water draining from
these surfaces gains speed and quickly rolls off all exposed ground, and even minor rains
become small scale floods eroding what little soil is exposed, quickly filling municipal storm
systems. Biopaving is a “green” solution for storm water management that integrates impervious
surfaces and islands of biomitigating and bioremediating plant material. These bio-islands of
phytoremediating plants are manufactured into the product and unwrapped by the environment
after installation through biodegradation. The Biopaver is an innovative interlocking concrete
paver with prepackaged soil and phytoremediating planting material. Once the paver is exposed
to the elements, the mold and packaging biodegrade and help set the paver into place, and
bioremediating plants begin to grow. These tough plants filter the contaminants from the storm
water as it passes through this pervious heart of the paver.
www.biopaver.com
Bombproof Fiber-Metal
After a bomb went off in 1988 on Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 259
passengers onboard, the Federal Aviation Administration created standards that industry
would have to meet if it chooses to deploy luggage containers capable of withstanding such a
blast. During the 1990s, the FAA tested 10 hardened luggage containers made from a variety
of materials, including reinforced aluminum, fiberglass, aramid fibers and polymers. Only one
container - concocted from fiber-metal laminates developed originally by the Delft University of
Technology in the Netherlands - passed the FAA’s test and received certification. The material,
called Glare (short for glass reinforced), consists of multiple aluminum layers interspersed with
layers of fiberglass and adhesive bonding that are supple yet strong. When used in fabricating
luggage containers, Glare can absorb bomb blasts without breaching. As Glare expands with a
blast, it absorbs the explosive energy and redistributes the impact load to the adjacent surface
area rather than to one specific weak spot. The bomb blast leaves a sizable deformation in the
container’s surface, but it remains intact. Moreover, whereas other FAA-tested containers were
also able to contain the bomb blast, Glare could resist the subsequent luggage-fueled fire inside
the container.
www.galaxyavsec.com
Corrugated Aluminum Panels
Doluflex panels consist of a corrugated aluminum plate machined with a cold forming system
and laminated between various materials. Doluflex 1 is a flexible panel used to produce bent
elements, and Doluflex 2 is an extremely stiff sandwich panel. Shaped structural panels are
also manufactured using Doluflex 2. Traditionally used in the ship-building industry, Doluflex
panels possess high chemical-physical resistance which make them suitable for building facade
systems. Doluflex can be worked with normal carpentry tools, and is classified non-combustible
according to RINA, Lloyd’s Register and Det Norske Veritas. The Doluflex 2 panel has a total
thickness of 5 mm, a transversal resistance to bending stress E x l = 2.48 x 106 and longitudinal
resistance to bending stress E x l = 1.97 x 106, with a total weight of 8.1 Kg/m².
www.donatigroup.it/inglese/default2.asp?lingua=eng
Fly-Ash Concrete
Contents: 50% fly ash, 50% cement Use: Building-walls, foundations Bonuses: Fly ash, produced
in abundance by coal-burning power plants, replaces a high volume of cement, which is third on
the top ten list for CO2 emissions. Problems: Rutherford-Chekene’s structural engineer Afshar
Jalalian, who created this mix for U.C. Berkeley’s Wurster Hall seismic retrofit project, says: “The
concrete dries at a slower rate; this is really not a problem but builders will need to adapt.” Also,
fly ash (a mixture of alumina, silica, unburned carbon, and metallic oxides) is extremely toxic,
though it may be that the concrete immobilizes its impurities.
Frit
Frit is the trade term used to describe recycled glass once it has been ground down into a
fine sand. Generally ‘Frit’ is seen as a midway stage in a longer manufacturing process and is
normally supplied as a raw material for making tiles or even recycled glass bottles. However, Frit
has an aesthetic all of its own and can be used in a variety of ways which don’t involve melting
or pressing. TriVitro in Seattle makes specially sized and colored chips of recycled glass for use
in terrazzo flooring, tiles, counter tops, concrete pavers, wall finishes and exposed aggregate