Experimental investigation on wind loads of planar porous façades

Porous fa & ccedil;ades have been widely used in modern architectural design recently. The flow through and around such porous fa & ccedil;ades is complicated, and the associated aerodynamic effects thereon remain unclear. Therefore, this paper mainly aims to gain insight into the wind actions on the planar porous fa & ccedil;ades, which would be affected by various factors, including the porosity ratio, the wind incidence angle, and the surrounding interference. Accordingly, a succession of wind tunnel tests was conducted on nine panels with porosity ratios ranging from 0 % to 74.76 %, which covered the most common porosity. The direct force measurement (DFM) method was employed by using the high-frequency force balance (HFFB) technique to attain the aerodynamic forces on the isolated porous fa & ccedil;ades and the fa & ccedil;ades with surrounding interference. Based on the testing results, the porosity reduction factor and the wind load-distribution factor are then calculated and fitted to account for the effects of porosity and wind incidence angle. Results show that the normal force coefficients of the panels decrease with the increase of the porosity ratio and the wind incidence angle, and the maximum coefficients take place for the solid panel when the wind is perpendicular to the fa & ccedil;ade. The isolated solid panel with an aspect ratio of 0.5 has a nominal drag coefficient of 1.19, while the panel with surrounding interference has a nominal drag coefficient of 1.53. Additionally, the dimensionless bending moment and torsion can be conservatively set at 0.5 and 0.2, respectively, for all test scenarios. The proposed estimating equations for porosity reduction factor and the wind load-distribution factor are in good agreement with the experimental results. The equations would greatly facilitate the determination of the wind loads on planar porous facades.