Sunday, April 26, 2009

Anti-Earthquake Construction

Sturdy Structure, Light Roof
Indonesia lays on an archipelago area which is wedged by 2 big mountain tracks, The Pacific and The Mediterranean. Those 2 mountain tracks together with the folds, faults, and the cracks have made Indonesia very sensitive to earthquakes. As yet we have been being frightened out of with the earthquakes which are happened to many areas in Indonesia like Bantul, Nias, Bengkulu, Aceh, and Padang which make most of the important building and public infrastructure collapse. The earthquake is the thing we couldn’t avoid, but it would be very wise if we could anticipate the impacts caused by it, especially for our own residential. How an appropriate combination of material and constructions make our house sturdy, not easy to get crash? Earthquakes in the area like Bantul and Nias make hundreds of buildings and houses in disorder. The question is: how could the buildings get too easy to collapse…? All the collapsed houses usually do not have a good structure. These kind of houses are usually made by local laborers who don’t have basic construction knowledges. Then the houses just built with no estimation of inhabitant secure and safety aspects. One of the specific characteristics is the house doesn’t have a good and planned frame. It doesn’t have the column poles, the sloofs (foundation beams) and the ring balks (rigid beams). In common, the houses usually just concrete brick stacks wall without any rigid construction. This kind of construction is able to accept pressure power but it can’t take a draw power. As a consequence, these concrete brick stacks can’t take moments of inertia shocks which have a shape of ground gravitation velocity. Automatically, the meeting of the brick formation cracks, pushed under and then collapses. Buildings in Bantul area don’t have anti-earthquake elements. For example, the house made by concrete brick walls which doesn’t have rigid united pole and beam, it wouldn’t have a rigid frame that prevent shape changing. It is in contrary with the well-structure houses. In essentials, a good house would always have a good structure frame, and what is more, the wall would be as a filler/ coverer and a separator for the outside space to the inside. In order to get a very sturdy one, the filler wall has to be tied to poles, foundation beams, and ring balks. Considering how important the construction strength is, we have to built a good building frame in building a house. Building frame is the combination of foundation together with the beams and balks. The foundation deepness is about 100 cms with a foundation basin ranging about 80 x 80 cms. This standard is enough for one story or two stories houses. On the top of the foundation then a sloof placed as a binder and also as a connector of the foundation to the pole and the wall. Other than supported by the sloof and foundation, building structures are also need to be supported by the poles as building load supporter elements, all at once as wall binder that make the wall don’t get collapse easily. This pole has to be bundled to the foundation sloof, and the top of pole would be bundled to ring balk. This type of structure makes the building sturdy and rigid. The stiffening of sloof make the frame sturdy and it could distribute the building load and the earthquake vibration. A sturdy construction could also made by a good lay out plan. A simple and symmetrical lay out plan would have a better endure power. Symmetrical lay out plan make it easy to put structure system and to apportionment it. The lay out plan has to show the binder column. For example, if the lay out has 12 meters length, than for each 3.5 meters length there will be a column. But that stipulation could be adapted to the frame types, the soil condition, and also the building loads. A compatible construction which is suitable to be applied is the well steel or wood construction. Another choice is the concrete construction. This one is very good to be applied in making a sturdy building, as long as the making processes is right and the materials used in the process is appropriate. Steel construction and structure could also applied to make building process faster; and the steel characteristic itself is able to take pull powers so it could balance the earthquake vibrations. (Translation)
AFTER EARTHQUAKE TIPS:
Checking the Damaged Sections
If we already have a building which has a sturdy and appropriate construction, then the eathquake vibration might still damage some part of the house. To convince ourselves, check these section:
-The Roof Construction Just look at the roof outer and inner. If it is a wood construction, make sure that no wood have cracked or broken. Also make sure that the wood construction position wouldn’t get displacement. If the construction get shift, fix it immediately so that it wouldn’t collapse.
-The Plafond Watch the plafond construction and its cover. Fix immediately the cracked or broken one. The broken plafond could suddenly collapse and fall on other beneath it.
-The Wall This section is also sensitive and has a potential to injure us. Observe if there is a leaning, displacement, or cracked part of the wall. If we find it out, then fix it soon. If the wall is lean, the better way is to scatter it and repair it so it could be standing again. To the cracked part, just watch closely the type of the crack. If it could cause danger, it is better to scatter it and to arrange it all once more.
-The Floor This section has the smaller risk of danger. The damage could be the lightest. The reparation could be done after we fix other part which is more important.
TO TREAT The Easy Break Part of House
The wall and the roof are parts of the building which are easy to get damage. To prevent the damages in these two elements, we may:
-To cope with wall damages: Strenghten the bound between the wall, column, and the balk by setting an anchor between the wall to the column or balk.
-To cope with roof damage: For the roof with wood frame, put the anchor in each frame. Add the restraint by putting a steel plate in each sequels.
Source: Idea Magazine

1 comment:

SPWS said...

I think every house should adopt this kind of construction. Using it, every house can survive an earthquake.

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