Shell Structures Made of Curved Sandwich Panels: Assessment of the Load‐Bearing Capacity

Abstract

ABSTRACTLightweight constructions made of sandwich panels became well established for roof and wall claddings of industrial structures. Due to their good heat insulation, their excellent weight to load ratio and high load‐bearing capacity as well as the economical manufacturing and erection process, sandwich structures are build frequently. Besides the mentioned advantages the linear manufacturing process of sandwich panels usually limits the possible building cubature to rectangular shapes. In an interdisciplinary project, architectural, civil engineering and mechanical engineering institutes of Technische Universität Darmstadt are working on a design concept building shell structures with linear manufactured curved sandwich panels.A preliminary study indicates that arched sandwich beams have a high potential regarding the load‐bearing capacity. The comparison between arched and single span sandwich beams shows that, even for asymmetric loads, resulting stresses in the two‐hinged arches are significantly lower than in the related simply supported single span beams.To verify the results of the numeric study full‐scale tests on curved sandwich panels will be performed. Furthermore, an assessment of the load‐bearing behavior of the panels joints loaded with axial forces is planned. Based on the results further numeric studies will be conducted to investigate the behavior of whole shell structures following the developed design principle by taking into account realistic load cases for exemplary building applications, giving special attention to asymmetrical loads.Moreover, further research regarding the requirements for supporting structures as well as for the connection between the shell structure and the supporting structure is necessary to take into account the high axial forces, which are not common in sandwich structures.