Building Enclosures

Abhishek
Krishnakanth
Shankar
What is Building Enclosure ?
A Building Enclosure is the structural barrier between the interior and
exterior of a building & fenestration systems.It is responsible for
maintaining climate control within the interior of a building.

● The building envelope also keeps the interior free from moisture,
sound, and light. The building enclosure structure includes the:
● Roof.
● Walls.
● Foundation.
● Doors.
● Windows.

Example: Building Envelope Building Enclosure Components

Purpose of Building Enclosure
Building Enclosure helps to separate interior from exterior by Major functions of a Building Enclosure is to control
controlling:
Thermal Performance and Moisture control.
● Heat flow.
● Air flow.
● Vapor diffusion.
● Water penetration.
● Condensation.
● Light and solar radiation.
● Noise, fire and smoke.

Thermal Performance

Moisture Control
 Purpose of Building Enclosure
Building Enclosure also provides

• Support- Resist and transfer physical forces like Earthquake &

Dead loads, Wind & Snow loads from inside and out.

• Control - Manage mass and energy flows.

• Aesthetic - Gives a good aesthetic appeal to building facade.

• Distribution - protect and house building services like

electricity,plumbing, gas lines .
Materials
Common materials are used to form the building enclosure structure and contribute
to the structure by having long lasting, insulating, water repellent, sound blocking,
and light filtering characteristics.
Common roof material asphalt, composite, wood, metal, clay, slate, and rubber.
Typical wall material includes brick, stone, stucco, glass block, wood, concrete,
and vinyl.
Foundation simply consists of stone, brick, or forms of concrete.
Window frames and doors share common materials such as aluminum,
composite, fiberglass, vinyl, and wood. Specialty coatings and tints, along with
gases, are commonly applied to any glass on both windows and doors.

Building enclosure materials are dependent on the climate, culture and available
resources of the place.
Layers of a Building Enclosure

Building Envelope
Double skin facades
The Double Skin Facade is a system consisting of two glass skins placed in such a way that air flows in the
intermediate cavity.

● The ventilation of the cavity can be natural, fan supported or mechanical. The glass skins can be single or
double glazing units with a distance from 20 cm up to 2 meters
● Double skin façades (DSF) are a good example of such complex facade
which have both a high architectural value and a great energy impact.
● They can also be used as solar collectors as the air between the two
skins can heat due to greenhouse effect.

The following figure shows the components of a double skin facade.

1. Exterior glazing.
2. Interior glazing.
3. Structural frame.
4. Operable sun shade.
5. Sun shade canopy.
6. Upper operable ventilation.
7. Maintenance catwalks.

Source:civil engg.seminar , article : double skin facade

Double skin facades
Exterior and interior glazing:

● The choice of the glass type for the interior and exterior panes
depends on the typology of the facade.
● In case of a facade ventilated with outdoor air, an insulating pane
(sealed double-glazed unit) is usually placed as a thermal break at the
interior side and a single pane at the exterior side.
● In case of a facade ventilated with indoor air, the insulating pane is
SUMMER AIRFLOW
usually placed at the exterior side, the single pane at the interior side.

Structural frame:

● Aluminium framing offers several advantages including long life span,

fire resistance, corrosion resistance, strength, durability and the
potential to be recycled when the building reaches the end of its
useful life.
● Glazing infill consists of an aluminium frame attached directly to
structure.
● The frame has rubber gaskets to hold the panes of glass in place.

Source:civil engg.seminar , article : double skin facade WINTER AIRFLOW

 Double skin facades
An air cavity between the exterior and interior glazing:
● The ventilation of the cavity may be totally natural, fan supported (hybrid) or
totally mechanical.
● The exterior cavity surface is made up by a cladding system. Usually, it is fully
glazed (single glazing).The interior surface of a naturally ventilated facade is
composed of an opaque wall and an operable window.
Sunshade canopy:
● A sunshade canopy is provided to protect the solar sun shading device from sun
and rain. Venetian Blind

Upper and lower operable ventilation:

● These ventilations can either be left open all the time (passive systems), or opened
by hand or by machine (active system).
● Active systems are very complicated and therefore expensive in terms of
construction and maintenance.

Maintenance catwalks:
● Maintenance catwalks are generally provided for cleaning the windows.
Sometimes maintenance walkways present in the cavity between the two skins
can be, integrated into the emergency egress paths

Source:civil engg.seminar , article : double skin facade Maintenance catwalk

FACADE CONSTRUCTION AND WORKING

● A curtain wallis built in front of a building structure to form the

outside facade of the building and to guarantee the wind and water
tightness of the building.
● Curtain walling panels are usually supported on four sides by the
transoms and mullions which frame them.
● One of the main requirements of a glazed facade is to guarantee
the air and watertightess of the building.
● In general two systems are used to achieve this : Siliconised Structural ladder frame
glazing and preformed EPDM gaskets. erection Structural ladder frame

Inner glass skin installed Outer glass skin installed

Electrochromic Glass
● Smart windows (also referred to by the names smart
glass, switchable windows, and dynamic windows) do
exactly that using a scientific idea called
electrochromism.
● in which materials change color (or switch from
transparent to opaque) when you apply an electrical
voltage across them.
● Typically smart windows start off a blueish color and Electrochromic coating
gradually (over a few minutes) turn transparent when
the electric current passes through them.

● There are quite a few different types of electrochromic

glass:
1. Some merely darken (like photochromic sunglasses, which turn
darker in sunlight),
2. Some darken and become translucent,
3. Mirror-like and opaque.

● Each type is powered by a different technology these

works on the basis of based on the movement of lithium
ions.

Electrochromic tinted glass

Electrochromic Glass
● More sophisticated windows (using low-e heat-reflective glass) are coated with a
thin layer of metallic chemicals for thermal insulation.
● Electrochromic windows work a little bit like this, only the metal-oxide coatings
they use are much more sophisticated and deposited by processes similar to
those used in the manufacture of integrated circuits (silicon computer chips).

Production :
● a window like this can be made of either glass or plastic coated with multiple thin
layers by a process known as sputtering (a precise way of adding thin films of one
material onto another)

Working:
The window has a double-sandwich of five ultra-thin layers:
1. a separator in the middle,
2. two electrodes (thin electrical contacts) on either side of the separator,
3. two transparent electrical contact layers on either side of the electrodes.

● The basic working principle involves lithium ions (positively charged lithium that
migrate back and forth between the two electrodes through the separator.
● Normally, when the window is clear, the lithium ions reside in the innermost
electrode which is made of something like lithium cobalt oxide (LiCoO2).
● When a small voltage is applied to the electrodes, the ions migrate through the
separator to the outermost electrode .
● No power is needed to maintain electrochromic windows in their clear or dark
state—only to change them from one state to the other. MUSEUM OF SCIENCE : BOSTON
Stick-on electrochromic films
● Self-adhesive and stick-on electrochromic film you can apply to your existing
windows and switch on and off with simple smartphone apps.
● Electrochromic films use technology similar to an LCD display, which uses liquid
crystals, under precise electronic control, to change how much light can get
through. When the current is switched on, the crystals line up like opening blinds,
allowing light to stream straight through.
● switched off, the crystals orient themselves randomly, scattering any light passing
through in random directions, so making the windows turn opaque. The
performance is impressive.

Advantages Disadvantages
● In their darkened state, they reflect back virtually all ● It's a given that glass printed with electrodes and fancy
(about 98 percent of) the light falling on them, so they metal coatings is going to be several times more
can dramatically reduce the need for air-conditioning. expensive to install than ordinary glass.
● they can easily be controlled by a smart-home system ● Durability of the material.
or a sunlight sensor. ● Another drawback of current windows is the time they
● Windows like this could save up to 8 percent of a take to change from clear to opaque and back again.
building's total energy consumption; they use only tiny ● Some technologies can take minutes, though stick-on
amounts of electricity to switch from dark to light electrochromic films are much faster, changing from
(100 windows use about as much energy as a single clear to opaque and back in less than a second.
incandescent lamp) .
Low-tech adaptive facade : RMIT Design Hub
Location : RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
Category : University
Architects in Charge : Sean Godsell, Hayley Franklin

● The facade comprises a specifically detailed double glazed inner skin

on each face of the building and an automated operable second skin
shading device.
● It is made up of nominally 600 mm diameter sandblasted glass disks,
which are fixed to either a horizontal or vertical aluminium axel.
● Each axel is fixed to the outer face of a galvanised steel cylinder.
● 21 glass discs and steel cylinders are fixed together in panels of
nominally 1.8 m by 4.2 m, which are supported on a secondary
galvanised steel frame set out about 700 mm from the curtain wall
face of the building. These are accessed by an external service
walkway on each level.
● Each typical panel is made up of 12 operable glass
discs and 9 discs which are fixed,At the ground
and plant room levels all glass disks will be
fixed. There are 86 panels on each level and
therefore 774 panels for the nine levels of
the building.
RMIT DESIGN HUB , MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA
● The face is a double skin facade.
● In particular the outer skin of the Hub incorporates
automated sun shading that includes photovoltaic cells,
evaporative cooling and fresh air intakes that improve the
internal air quality and reduce running costs.
● Perimeter air intakes and fine mist sprinklers incorporated
into the double glazed inner skin provide passive cooling to
the UFAD system. section
● Fresh naturally cooled air provides a less expensive, lower
energy consumption and more desirable thermal comfort
alternative to a wholly conditioned work environment.
 Depolluting facades

Designed by mexican based architecture firm

It neutralizes the air pollution of

1000cars/day ..?

Public building ,mexico

How it works
It works with a principle of chemical reaction

The building facade is made out of normal plastic panels and coated with TITANIUM OXIDE-BASED
PIGMENT.

According to the designers when UV-Rays of sunlight reach the titanium dioxide on the tile,it triggers a
chemical reaction between the tiles and the smog in the air.

The end result the smoke breaks down into safer chemicals such as water,carbon dioxide and calcium
nitrate
ETFE (Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene) Panels as building material

It is a fluorine-based plastic

It is designed to have high corrosion

resistance and strength over a wide
temperature range

Properties :-

Transparency:

ETFE is normally a very transparent

material,a single layer ETFE has approx 85%
light transparency.similar to glass materials
Solar control;-

Solar transmission cold be modified based on the need.

Ex:-multiple layer will transmit lesser degree of light

compared to single layer

Life :-

ETFE Foil has an excellent life expectancy as it is

unaffected by UV light, atmospheric pollution and other
forms of environmental weathering.

While no ETFE structures have been in place for long

enough to gain a true understanding of the life cycle
 Case Study

Project brief

NATIONAL AQUATIC CENTRE BEIJING

Section module-1 Section module-2
Thank you.