Fire Safety Engineering Research and Technology Centre (FireSERT) University of Ulster: Recent Developments

The Institute of Fire Safety Engineering Research and Technology Centre (FireSERT) at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland has been a major provider of higher technical fire safety education, fire related research and services to industry for over 20 years. Its internationally recognised research spans the fields of fire dynamics, structural fire engineering, human behaviour in fire and more recently fire (CFD) modelling. Since 1991, it has offered the only PG Dip/MSc Fire Safety Engineering programme in the United Kingdom. In September 2000 FireSERT was the recipient of a £5.7 m Joint Infrastructure Fund (JIF) Award to build new fire safety engineering laboratories on the University's Jordanstown campus. These new facilities unparallel in the University sector in the UK offer greater scope and depth to the FireSERT's research portfolios. The new facilities will be extensively used in support of FireSERT's suite of MSc Fire Safety Engineering and DPhil programmes. This paper presents a brief history of FireSERT and its achievements, together with an update on the new facility, current research themes, taught programmes, research opportunities and visions for the future.     

Method for detecting moment connection fracture using high-frequency transients in recorded accelerations

The 1994 Northridge earthquake caused brittle fractures in steel moment frame building connections, despite causing little visible building damage in most cases. Future strong earthquakes are likely to cause similar damage to the many un-retrofitted pre-Northridge buildings in the western US and elsewhere. Without obvious permanent building deformation, costly intrusive inspections are currently the only way to determine if major fracture damage that compromises building safety has occurred. Building instrumentation has the potential to provide engineers and owners with timely information on fracture occurrence. Structural dynamics theory predicts and scale model experiments have demonstrated that sudden, large changes in structure properties caused by moment connection fractures will cause transient dynamic response. A method is proposed for detecting the building-wide level of connection fracture damage, based on observing high-frequency, fracture-induced transient dynamic responses in strong motion accelerograms. High-frequency transients are short (<1 s), sudden-onset waveforms with frequency content above 25 Hz that are visually apparent in recorded accelerations. Strong motion data and damage information from intrusive inspections collected from 24 sparsely instrumented buildings following the 1994 Northridge earthquake are used to evaluate the proposed method. The method’s overall success rate for this data set is 67%, but this rate varies significantly with damage level. The method performs reasonably well in detecting significant fracture damage and in identifying cases with no damage, but fails in cases with few fractures. Combining the method with other damage indicators and removing records with excessive noise improves the ability to detect the level of damage.     

苏通大桥北索塔墩钻孔平台施工技术

介绍在深水、大流速的北索塔墩区直接利用钻孔桩结构钢护筒搭设世界最大群桩基础桩基施工平台适用条件,设计与施工方法以及质量控制措施和实施效果。     

关于施工企业编制内部定额的探讨

结合我国目前全面推行的工程量清单计价模式和最低价中标,阐述了编制企业定额的意义,介绍了企业定额编制的原则、内容及其依据,并就编制企业施工定额时应注意的问题进行了分析,以满足我国建筑市场健康发展的需要。     

港渝两地边坡工程中土钉技术的对比研究

香港经过20a的理论研究和工程实践，总结出一套较完善的土钉加固边坡的设计、施工方法和规范；重庆在多年采用土钉加固土质和强风化岩质边坡的工程实践中取得了大量经验，并颁布了相关的规范。港渝两地具有既相似又各有特点的地形地貌和工程地质条件，通过对比分析和研究了两地土钉边坡设计步骤和施工方法及特点，为边坡加固工程中采用土钉技术提供了参考意见。     

Continuous monitoring of short term dissolved oxygen and algal dynamics

Dissolved oxygen (DO) in coastal bays with frequent algal blooms can undergo significant diurnal changes. Short-term DO and algal dynamics in a sub-tropical, nitrogen-limited, marine ecosystem are studied by means of a specially designed telemetry system. The high resolution data show clearly the importance of the vertical DO structure, and its relationship with environmental variables (solar radiation, water temperature, wind, tidal current) and phytoplankton dynamics. The design, instrumentation and calibration, and operational experience of the system are described. The simple and robust system has proved useful in (i) providing continuous data for full testing of water quality models, and (ii) the planning of field experiments to study algal dynamics.     

输水管材的选择及设计施工中应注意的问题

结合工程实例对城市输水工程管材的选择进行了论述，介绍了各种管材的优缺点，简述了输水工程经济流速与经济管径的选择，探讨了在设计施工中注意的问题并提出了相应的改进措施，以适应国民经济的发展，缓解城市的工业用水与生活用水困难的问题。     

预应力抗拔锚杆在体育馆工程中的应用

某体育馆工程地下室有严格的抗浮要求,管桩基础抗拔力承担不了地下水浮力与大斜柱的拉力,在传递拉力的大斜柱下部承台部位,设计了预应力抗拔锚杆。整个工程共设计160根,长度14.5cm～30cm,使工程达到抗浮要求。     

桥梁用橡胶制品的应用现状

针对橡胶制品在桥梁上的应用日趋广泛，总结了桥梁用橡胶制品在支座、伸缩缝、止水带、拉索减振、空心混凝土预制梁预制及防落梁装置中的应用及现状，并对将来的发展提出了看法。     

清单计价模式下工程变更的单价审计初探

工程变更在工程实施过程中普遍存在,变更费用的多少直接关系到业主和承包商的切身利益,而变更费用的重点在于变更单价。本文通过分析工程变更的产生原因、工程量变更所带来的工程量调整,对如何准确、合理地确定变更单价进行初步探索。