2. Case study : Tower Center International Bucharest
Building Main Data
● Plan - 25,5m x 41,5m
● Span 7.5m
● Bay 7.5m
● Storey height 4.0m
● Total height 106.3m
● No. stories 3B + 26S (28m depth)
● Foundations Mat foundations + piles
● Main structure Partially encased steel
columns, steel beams and bracings, composite slabs
● Location Bucharest
● Erection March - November 2006
● Completion - May, 2007
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcsr.2019.01.007 Kons Building
Tower Centre International building in Bucharest - Part I: Structural design
The building is located in Bucharest, Romania – the European capital with the highest seismic hazard. The building was planned to construt with precast columns and in 2005 new codes were adopted by Romania and in this code, the seismic resistance should be higher when compared to old code, thus they adopted for steel composite structure.
The frame system used for this building is braced and unbraced steel frames (dual structural configuration) with moment resisting frames and concentrically braced frames - X
Concentrically Braced Frames
The cruciform cross-section columns is made of hot rolled profiles, were partially encased in reinforced concrete to increase strength, stiffness and fire resistance. The columns are bolted to the beam which are made up of hot-rolled I-sections.
In this also, flooring structure for the whole building was originally calculated as pre-fabricated or in-situ concrete floor slabs on concrete floor beams and columns. But to reduce the loads on the existing 3 base floors and due to zoning issue on the building height, composite slabs were introduced to increace the head room height.
Shear Connectors are designed as per Europen code min of 0:8fuπd2/4 ɣv and 0:29αd2 root fckEc / ɣv alpha factor of height of stud
The slab elements are placed directly onto the lower flange of the beam, which results in an integrated solution which reduces the thickness of the floor and the beams can span upto 14m.