Making It Happen
Beyond North Ave
While the preliminary findings are months away, the NEESR project has already snagged the attention of professionals outside academia. Engineers, architects, policymakers, and builders are all eager for the project’s goal: well-researched, easily adaptable, cost-effective retrofits for seismically vulnerable buildings. Researchers will apply different shape memory alloys (SMAs) to three sections of the building, and compare the results to a fourth section that will have no reinforcements. A fair amount of research backs the use of SMAs, like nitinol, over steel supports. Detailed analytical studies of multi-story buildings have shown that, when subjected to ground-motion, the SMA bracing systems reduce the peak interstory drifts by an average of 75 percent.
From June through September, workers from Turner Construction and Winter Construction worked with more than 20 subcontractors to build the 3,000-square-foot NEESR structure that will be used to test earthquake retrofits. Bottom right photo: Doctoral student Tim Wright (right) and project superintendent J.T. Mote review plans for the NEESR building. Jessica Hunt
Georgia Tech Engineers, Spring 2014
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