Utvärdering av den bärande tegel- och betongstommen i en byggnad från år 1916
This Master thesis is about a postal- and telegraphic building in Eskilstuna, Sweden. The construction methods for the specific building and buildings in general from the same time are described. The purpose of the report is to describe the loads acting on the building and how it has been built and why it has been rebuilt during the years. After this, possibilities of reconstruction and adaptation for today?s demands can be evaluated. The building?s bearing structure consists of masonry walls, columns of concrete, slabs of concrete and high rafters of wood that carry the copper roof. The walls are not insulated since the masonry wall was the insulation available at the time. Some parts of the building have been strengthened over the years but as for the rest it is the same as it was when constructed in 1916. In the process of this work, some interesting design solutions were discovered that are described in detail. The concrete slabs contain airbrick members, which made the floor lighter but still taking almost as much load as one constructed only with concrete. Concrete as a material is also discussed. It was very new as a building material at the time and there are doubts about how well the concrete could be mixed and which load bearing capacity could be reached.On the entrance floor the support system has been strengthened with columns and beams of steel. A calculation shows that the newer members are no longer needed but they must have been in the 1930s, when the steel was added. Reinforcements could result in problems at the joints to the old bearing system; as the points of loading may have changed. Calculations are made according to Eurocodes to investigate the load bearing capacity today. One external wall and one column on the entrance floor have been selected as they are considered the most loaded and the floor height is greater here than in other parts of the building. The result is that the capacity of the structure is generally large, as is expected since it is a massive building and as such often oversized at the time of construction. Complicating the analysis of the calculations is the uncertainty of material strength for masonry and concrete. If the calculations are made with the low values that were used in the 1910s, the investigated wall fails compared to today's requirements. Therefore, caution should be taken regarding additional loading of the wall. If alterations are made in similar houses, the risk is that they are considered extremely oversized so that the danger of further loading is neglected. The results here do show that it is always important to look at the individual parts bearing capacity.