THE BEHAVIOR OF GLASS UNDER WIND LOADING

The behaviour of glass under wind loading has been investigated by various researchers. They have shown that the strength of glass varies with load duration and glass size, and that a cumulative damage criterion can be used to determine the effect of the randomly fluctuating wind pressure. They have also shown that when glass panels are subjected to high loads, the relationship between the applied loads and the resulting stresses becomes non-linear. This paper presents the results of recent research at Monash University, in which it was shown that direct integration of load-time history for glass design is possible, provided suitable relationships between the applied load and the resultant stresses can be developed. In this research, the cumulative effect of the wind pressure fluctuations over the entire duration of wind storms was investigated. It was found that window pane geometry is important when determining the equivalent wind pressures for glass design.