Title: Dynamic analysis of glass curtain walls with protective films subjected to blast loading

Authors: Ge Jie; Li Guoqiang

Addresses: College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092 China. ' State Key Lab for Disaster Reduction in Civil Engineering, College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China

Abstract: Recent terrorist events have underscored the importance of designing glass curtain walls as engineered systems. Glass panels which shatter in the explosion produce high velocity fragments, the cause of majority of injuries in such incidents. Glass curtain walls with protective films have proven to be well suited for use in glazing systems that resist blast loading. The rectangular glass plates within the curtain wall are composed of the insulating glass or the laminated glass. In this study, dynamic behaviours of the two kinds of glass curtain walls with protective films are investigated. The glass plates are treated as elastic materials, PVB interlayer and protective films are treated as viscoelastic and plastic materials respectively. A non-linear dynamic finite element code (LS-DYNA) is used to conduct the stress and deflection analysis. The analytical results on dynamic behaviours of protective films can be used to mitigate hazard from broken glazing due to blast loading.

Keywords: blast loading; glass curtain walls; protective films; insulating glass; laminated glass; glazing systems; blast resistance; finite element method; FEM; stress analysis; deflection analysis; dynamic behaviour; explosions.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSTRUCTE.2012.047709

International Journal of Structural Engineering, 2012 Vol.3 No.3, pp.160 - 169

Published online: 20 Aug 2014 *

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