Engineering Commons^™

Forensic Investigation Of Building Failure – The Harbour Cay Condominium Disaster, John Airis

Publications and Research

When a building suffers collapse, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is tasked with conducting an investigation into the cause. Often OSHA will request technical assistance from the National Institute for Standards and Technology to assist in the forensic technical aspects determining a most probable cause. This forensic effort entails many actions. The Harbour Cay Condominium disaster occurred on March 28, 1981 in Cocoa Beach, Florida. It was a total collapse of a five story reinforced concrete structure during the last stage of roof construction, resulting in 11 deaths and 24 injuries. The investigation report revealed structural design …

Static Analysis Of Structural Members, Amani Calderon, Alexis Villalona, Farhad Alinaghizadeh

Publications and Research

This research is devoted to statics analysis of structural members under mechanical loads. Static analysis of beams under uniform transverse mechanical loads is presented. The beams are supported by simply supported boundary condition at both sides. The equilibrium equation of the beams is obtained and solved using analytical method and numerical method. The numerical method employed in this work is generalized differential quadrature (GDQ) method. The type of differential quadrature method used for numerical solution is the polynomial-based GDQ method. The differential equation is discretized into algebraic equations based on the GDQ technique. The algebraic equations are then solved to …

Green Roof System Integrated Soil Methods, Jude R. Vallon, Ivan L. Guzman

Publications and Research

Large metropolitan areas like NYC are seeking to integrate sustainability into retrofitting buildings for the development of green infrastructure. Among the many environmental issues of urbanization, the UHI (urban heat island) effect and storm water runoff are of particular interest when it comes building structures. Individual buildings can contribute towards mitigating these effects with implementation of vegetative rooftops, i.e. Green Roofs. Commercial buildings are currently receiving government incentives and new constructions are required to include green roof installations. However, if existing buildings are considering the addition of a green roof on an existing roof, they have to factor in the …

Static Analysis Of Circular Plates Under Mechanical Loads, Harpreet Lalia

Publications and Research

In this research statics analysis of circular plates is performed using SolidWorks.

Circular plates with different material properties, thickness to radius ratios, and boundary conditions under mechanical loads are modeled and analyzed in SolidWorks.

The results are obtained for deflections of circular plates under uniform and point loads.

A three-dimensional (3D) model of circular plates is first created in SolidWorks. Then the material properties, mechanical loads and boundary conditions are defined for the plate.

It is found deflection of plates is depended on magnitude of mechanical loads, geometrical parameters, boundary conditions and material properties. Responses of SolidWorks for deflections of …

P-12 Potential Compact Fiberboard From Combining Shredded Corrugated Cardboard And Pet Water Bottles, Joshua Lim Khye Shuen

Celebration of Research and Creative Scholarship

Corrugated cardboard and plastic bottles (PET) can each be recycled; however the current research is looking at recycling both cardboard and PET into a new combined material. The current method of recycling corrugated cardboard is to shred and recombine the material to make new cardboard. According to the Container Recycling Institute (http://www.container-recycling.org/), only 7.5% of PET manufactured in the US and Canada are recycled. The sheer amount of corrugated cardboard and PET bottles can be recycled for other practical uses. Corrugated cardboard and PET bottles, when shredded and placed into a 3x3x6 inch mold, can be combined together and baked …

The Effects Of Erosion Structures On Triplett Creek From The Fall Of 2016, 2017, And 2018, Haylee Winters

Posters-at-the-Capitol

Triplett Creek is a tributary of the Licking River. It runs through Morehead, KY, where we are conducting our research.

The creek was modified in the 1970s but construction was halted before the project was complete. Unfortunately, the result was an increase in overflow and subsequent riverbank erosion. The city installed sediment trap rocks in hopes of slowing down the water and decreasing erosion. We are using drones and photogrammetric software to map the area and compare images of the river to determine erosion rates. The new images will be compared to ones taken in previous years to visualize the …