Masonry Magazine October 2003 Page. 46
MCAA News
the hallmark of ASTM," said Thomas Schwartz, chair of the ASTM Subcommittee on the Performance of Exterior Wall Systems that approved the new standard practice. "The new standard provides cities with a comprehensive benchmark that draws on the best existing facade ordinances in cities across the US and the expertise and experience of members of the ASTM task group and subcommittee."
The ASTM members who created this standard represent leading forensic architects and engineering firms all over North America. ASTM Task Group Co-chairs Erdly and Petermann and Subcommittee Chair Schwartz were key participants in the development process.
Schwartz is president of Simpson Gumpertz & Heger Inc., a national consulting engineering firm that designs, investigates, and rehabilitates buildings and structures of all types. As head of the Building Technology Division in the Boston, Mass, office, Schwartz has conducted field and laboratory investigations and produced new and remedial designs for building envelope systems, including curtain walls, glazing, roofing, waterproofing and masonry over the last 30 years. He is active in national standards development and research on various topics related to the construction industry and is a frequent lecturer at construction industry conferences.
Erdly is president of Masonry Preservation Services of Berwick, Pa., a contractor specializing in building facade restoration, and has lectured widely on the subject of masonry preservation. He has served as president of the Sealant, Waterproofing, and Restoration Institute and has authored several papers on sealant applications, failure analysis, and masonry treatment. He is co-editor of the ASTM book, Water Leakage through Building Facades.
Petermann is an architect and consultant in the New York office of Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc., a national engineering and architecture firm. Petermann has experience in investigation and repair of both historic and contemporary building facades and roofs. In the past 15 years, he has surveyed numerous facades and roofs involving a wide variety of material and component failures. He specializes in facade inspection techniques and data acquisition. He recently developed a technique that utilizes a handheld computer for entering data from 125,000 facade panels on nine different buildings.
For more information about ASTM International or E2270, "Practice for Periodic Inspection of Building Facades for Unsafe Conditions," visit ASTM International's web site at www.astm.org.
Bricks Get I.Q. Boost
If walls could talk they might gossip a little. But researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign say walls could provide far more valuable information, with a little help from electrical nanotechnology.
In June, Chang Liu, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, and graduate student John Engel announced they had developed a "smart brick" that could transmit information about building conditions to a remote operator. "This innovation could change the face of the construction industry," said Liu. "We are living with more and more smart electronics all around us, but we still live and work in fairly dumb buildings. By making our buildings smarter, we can improve both our comfort and safety."
Smart bricks are essentially tiny sensor/transmitters installed into a normal construction brick. The prototype combines a thermistor, two-axis accelerometer and multiplexer and can monitor a building's temperature, vibration and movement. The bricks could transmit structural information to firefighters, earthquake cleanup crews and maintenance workers. Although the technology is currently housed in a brick, Liu said it could easily be applied to other construction media, including concrete blocks, laminated beams and structural steel.
The wireless sensors at the heart of smart bricks could also lower the cost of construction management. Instead of spending money on labor to run and monitor wire-connected sensors and controls, owners could pay a fewer number of people.