Engineering

කොන්ක්‍රීට් ෆයිලින්

නව නිවසක් ගොඩනැගිල්ලක් ඉදිකිරීමේදී ඔබ තෝරා ගන්නා භූමියට අනුව

ඔබ නිවස හෝ ගොඩනැගිල්ල ඉදි කර කල් ගත වූ පසු ඔබ දුක් මහන්සි වී උපයා ගත් මුදල් වලින් තැනු ඔබගේ සොදුරු නිවස හෝ ඔබගේ ගොඩනැගිල්ල ගිලා බැසිමකට ලක් වුව හොත් ... ඔබ කොච්චර කනස්සල්ලට පත් වෙනවාද ?.

සැම භූමියකට නොව ගොඩ කරපු ඉඩම් වල ,මඩ සහිත ඉඩම් වල තනන නිවස හෝ ගොඩනැගිල්ල මෙවැනි ආකාරයේ ආපදාවකට ලක්වීමට පුළුවන.

> එසේනම් ඔබ කලයුත්තේ කුමක්ද ? ..

*** ඔබේ ගැටලුවට සාර්ථකව ප්‍රතිපල ගනදීමට අපි සුදානම් ....

>කොන්ක්‍රීට් ෆයිලින් ඉදිකර එය මත ඔබගේ නිවස ,ගොඩනැගිල්ල අවශ්‍ය මුල් අඩිතාලම තනා දීමට අපි සුදානම් ..

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How To Check The Structural Stability Of Your Foundation And causes Of weak Foundations.

Foundation as the most important part of the building needs adequate attention for you to be able to sleep in your house with your eyes closed.
For a built building especially after a few years you need to recheck and ascertain all is well. These are some of the considerations you must make.

(1)Settlement-Every houses do settle without exception especially when it is newly built, but the effect is more noticeable after a few years of completion. The severity of the settlement is based on a couple of factors like how well the house was designed and built, attention to details and others. Settlement can be very noticeable in some houses when one side visually begins to sink, which will require urgent attention before the house finally collapse, the attention of a structural engineer is required here. Beams and other measures may have to be introduced on that foundation for the house to be saved.

(2)Cracks-Cracks may also be noticeable in some buildings foundation, this may be caused by a lot of factors like
i-settling which may be caused by loosed soil and is noticeable when you started having horizontal cracking.
ii-Soil moisture around foundation can also cause cracking and eat deep into your foundation ,hence is important your backfill the surrounding wall of your building and protect it from onrushing water, also water from the soil have to be channeled to drains quickly. Desist from making water settle around the foundation of your building for too long. Expansion of soil when wet will create pressure on the concrete.
iii-improper mixture and inadequate water during mixing of concrete can also cause cracks when concrete begins to shrink due to curing after a while.
When preparing your concrete make sure you mix the elements-cement,snd,water very well before pouring.

(3)Water movement around the foundation as discussed in (2)

(4)Type of foundation– You need to to know the right foundation for a particular building and soil type, anything lower than what is required may result in foundation problems, for instance introducing strip or pad foundation where you are supposed to have raft foundation may cause problem in a few years.

(5)Professional Handling-If not for anything make sure a professional supervise your foundation being the most important part of the building, but if you doubt the competencies of your builder, then you also have reason to be skeptical about your foundation.

(6)Mixture ratio of the concrete is very important and the professional recommendations must be followed.

(7)Types of Soil-If the building is on vegetable matter or on dumpsite and it was not properly cleared and refilled with adequate strong soil, the probability of you having a weak foundation is high. So before you build on any dumpsite,debris and vegetable matter must be excavated and removed. Also every materials and debris used during construction of the building around the foundation must be removed to avoid them been buried on the ground which may disintegrate and weaken your foundation.

(8)Improper filling or Backfilling of the foundation when not given adequate attention will also affect the foundation. For some structures you’ll notice the surrounding soil sinking after few rainfall because the soil were not properly filled and well compacted. Foundations requires hardcores and it must be put in place to avoid too much pressure on the foundation.

Advantages of using Wood or Timber in Building Construction

 There are many materials used for building construction but wood is one of the oldest materials used and still very much useful in modern buildings. Likely the trend will continue in the future. Hereunder are some advantages

• Lightweight and supports self- Wood is structurally strong, it has great ability to support its own weight. The weight to resistance ratio is high.
• Electrical Resistance-Wood that is dried is a good resistor to electrical transmission. Hence is a safety material for electrical cables because it doesn’t conduct electricity though this goes contrary as the wood becomes wet.
• Sound insulation-Wood has hole/pores inside which helps to absorb sound and reduces echo in building. It does not transmit sound easily which makes it good for sound insulation.
• Aesthetic-There are variations of wood and they can be made to an assembly of aesthetically pleasing products
• Ease of use-In comparison to other structural materials, it is easy to manipulate and use for construction.
• Reusable-Wood can be uninstalled and used severally on other tasks onsite.
• Renewable-Wood is gotten cheaply from the forest, as long as trees are planted to replace the fell ones the wood will always be available for generations to come.
• Environmental impact-Wood has less devastating impact on the environment when discarded compare to steel, plastics and other building materials
• Heat insulation-Though fire attack can be devastating, wood has the ability to retain room temperature in a room.
• Wood is cheap compared to other building materials
• It decomposes easily when discarded and fertilise the soil unlike steel and plastics.
• Wood react less to chemical or oxidation attacks . It doesn’t rust unlike metals
• Wood can easily be installed on a building site and easily dismantled
• There are thousands of wood variations, they are organic products and are abound in the forest. It gives interesting variations in use and aesthetics
• Durable-with good treatment and application, wood can stay for centuries. There are examples of buildings built with wood that have spanned centuries.
• Wood is not toxic
• Wood is readily available all over the forest
• Less risk of collapse- Due to very light selfweight and high tensile strength collapse is uncommon with buildings built with wood
• Design flexibility-It is easy to make interesting designs with wood
• It serves as a formwork for concrete
• Wood also removes carbon from the atmosphere contributing to the environment
• Wood helps to save time. Constructing with wood saves time.
• Because of high stability, constructing with wood is good for seismic prone zones- movement of earth by tremors, earthquakes e.t.c

Keys To Finishing Your Building Project On Time

Getting your project done at the stipulated time can save you money and contributes to the success of the building team. However, there are steps you have to take from day one.

• Purpose of Building- Right from the purpose of why the building should be in place can gear the contractors towards achieving the time frame set. Imagine a building that must be ready at a particular time for an event a building that loan has to be paid on and starting also within a time frame. So is important clear cut reason for the building and expectations on the part of the owners and contractors must be met.
• Scheduling- You need to allocate tasks with their timeframe for starting and completion , the allocated time for some tasks can go on together . All these will be in place, on a scheduled document you will need to work on and make available on site. It also helps to monitor progress of work and when lagging behind, steps to take to recover the time lost.
• Plan-The plan of the building must be ready on time and before the start of the project all necessary documents should be in place, this will save you from unnecessary ammendments due to unclear plan that is yet to be concluded.
• Bill of Quantity- You should atleast have an idea of the cost of the project to know if you can embark on it or not, this will help in budgeting controls and will make disbursements of funds faster and trackable.
• Design type- A complex design may affect project timing, hence it may be advisable to go for highly functional but simple designs with good aesthetics.
• Management-The management of funds, workers contractors and professionals will also help to fastrack your project as as everybody is aware of his or her task, no duplication or conflicts of works and there is perfect communication with everyone involved in the construction.
• Availability of funds- Money for tasks should be ready two days before the time for any task on site. This will increase speed/rate at which works are done since there are funds available for assigned tasks.
• Good access to site- When there is good road to site. Materials gets in quickly which in turn results to getting the job done faster.
• Security- The project site should be fenced and security guard should be on site. If possible for larger projects security apparatus like CCTV should be installed.Lighting should also be in place at night to discourage thieves from sabotaging the work on site.
• Storage- Adequate storage must be in place for the materials that will be used on site and properly secured with lock and keys with inventories on what goes out and comes in from the store.
• weather- Choosing the right season can also help your project to deliver fast . you are likely to get less disturbances from climatic elements during dry season. Rain sometimes disturbs workers from performing at optimal level. Rain can cause damages on site.
• Punctuality/manhour- The earlier workers gets to work and maintain daily working hours, the better for the speed of the project.
• Prompt payments of workers / contractors- prompt payments builds confidence towards you from workers, contractors and suppliers. Owning workers their daily stipend will make them to abscond from work or you will experience lack of commitments towards work which will affect the delivery time.
• Use of reliable and trusted suppliers- Suppliers with ability for prompt delivery and financial base will also help to speed the rate of completion of a building project.
• Ordering for materials before time- This is good to avoid delays on site.
• Bulk purchase- When you buy in bulk, you save time of going back and forth to purchase materials when there is sudden shortage. No time will be lost.
• Communication- When there is easy flow of information from the top to the least worker, everyone will be carried along on everyday task. And there won’t be conflict.
• Professionals- Employ professionals for your project, this saves you embarrassment and extra cost or repairing and amending badly done job which will also takes time.
• Prompt payments of government and other sundry charges- You have to make sure whatever is required from the authority is attended to promptly to avoid “stop order” of work from the authority.
• Contact every workers early enough a week before they will be needed on site to avoid disappointments.
• Safety measures- have a safety plan in place , buy and apply all protective gears to avoid accidents on site which can cause delay of works.
• Quality materials- The use of quality materials will make your building durable and with good workmanship you will have less amendments.
• Good workmanship
• Technology- Use of modern technology available may be costlier but at the long run is cheaper and delivers faster.
• Periodic meetings- This helps to monitor progress of works, reviews challenges and decides how to execute better.
• Documentation –have a proper documentation of day to day activities on site. Get all necessary papers from government and others available.
• Resources- With much resources available the faster you’ll get your project done.
• Learning from Projects around- To avoid previous mistakes committed by others before you start your project, review other buildings around site, discover their challenges and how they overcame them. This will also help to speed your project time.