Research on structural design of a super highrise building in Qatar

Abstract

Designed by John Novel, the super highrise office building in Doha adopts the exterior net tube composed of R.C. crossing diagrid columns and floor ring beams as the main structure. After examining the concrete creep effects, the loading, the construction sequence, the partially prestressing of ring beams, the progressive failure of the diagrid columns, the bearing capacity of diagrid column nodes, the temperature and shrinkage effects, the buckling of the diagrid column and the whole structure, some important incipient faults regarding structural safety in tender design were found. These faults include insufficient bearing capacity of the cross nodes, and the building inclination due to the differential shortening of the diagrid columns from concrete creep. Several effective technical improvements were employed to ensure the safety of the building, such as adopting hollow sections for the diagrid columns in the lower stories at the north side, the strengthening of the cross nodes of the diagrid columns b...