Construction Yard: Sprayed Concrete Building System

01/01/1977

Construction Experiment & Mock-up, Construction Process

91-page document describing general engineering concepts for the sprayed-concrete building system in and containing six parts. It includes five sections with: 1) General description of the building system; 2) Detailed specifications of building elements; 3) Specifications of structural scheme for a particular building; 4) Calculations of structural scheme and 5) Appendix section of 18 appendices with assumptions. An additional section containing various notes, sketches and structural outlines of plans, four photographs with drawings of color studies of two buildings, and a PMT with its negative image depicting a sketch of a building facade present the quality and features of the buildings to be produced by this construction system.

Authors:

Christopher Alexander, Donald Corner, UCB students, Center for Environmental Structure, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

Content of

Construction Innovation

Construction Yard: Experiments in spayed concrete 1977

Construction System, Sprayed Concrete, Sloped Roof & Vaulted Ceiling

Created by:

Christopher Alexander, UCB students

Spayed concrete experiments and mockups, conducted with graduate students at the University of California, Berkeley, as a special study course. The mockups included the construction of vaults, walls, columns, floors, beams, arches, in sprayed concrete over steel armature .

References

Scientific Research

Innovative Construction Systems, Techniques and Materials

Areas of focus:

Design and Building Process

Guiding idea:

Construction Innovation

One of the main topics of research, included in every building project, was to identify, early on in the design process, the material and techniques of construction. This would re-establish building as an art, and allow rapid shaping and adaptation, ...