CFRP Design Engineering
The feasibility call, the calculations and the seal that have to come before anything is bonded to a structure.
There are many reasons for restoring or increasing the structural capacity of structures: changes in the use of a structure resulting in an increase of service loads, building code regulations, construction error, design errors, or years of deterioration creating loss of capacity of existing structural members. Every one of them arrives as the same question first — will composite strengthening work here, and what would it have to be? Answering that is engineering, and it happens well before any fabric reaches the building.
What the design team produces
- Review of a potential application for feasibility, at no cost and no obligation.
- Budgetary proposals for the job, so the option can be priced against the alternatives.
- Specifications for the strengthening system.
- Stamped drawings and calculations.
- Quality control and testing of the installed work.
The design is sealed before anything is bonded to the structure.
Designed to ACI 440
Extensive testing of FRP assemblies has produced design values for axial load enhancement, shear enhancement, flexural increases, flood mitigation and blast mitigation, which is what allows a composite solution to be engineered rather than estimated. Delta’s associate team of engineers and project managers designs to ACI 440 and can assist a client’s design team in finding the best cost approach to a structural need. Every ACI 440 carbon fiber design it issues is built on those tested values rather than on a datasheet figure taken on trust. Material specifications should incorporate ICBO approval and the specific controls and guidelines set out in AC125 to ensure safety and design assurance — Delta installs all brands of fabrics and materials, so the specification decides the system, not the supply.
Working with the Engineer of Record
Delta’s design team works with the project Engineer of Record to reach a design build solution that meets the project’s requirements. Where a project has already been assessed as non-feasible, Delta can often help solve it through an alternate approach rather than returning the same answer — combining strengthening systems, or substituting enlargement and distribution ribs where composite alone will not supply the stiffness a member needs.
