In this reading, Ching discusses the bonding of masonry and the faces exposed. Vertical joints (Head joints) and horizontal joints (Bed joints) are the spaces between masonry that help join each layer and between courses. The six different joints Ching supplies in his book are: Concave, V, Flush, Raked, Struck, and Weathered joints. Along with the joints, he also provides us with six patterns of joining the bricks into layers. In Chapter twelve, he mentions lumber and the grade mark for it. Furthermore, plywood is generated by bonding veneers under heat and pressure. The grade stamp for Plywood is usually on the back of the wood panel, APA or the American Plywood Association. This includes the exposure level, which is the durability against weather conditions and panel grade along with span rating. Wood panels are layers of particle board, oriented strand board, and wafer board. In chapter four, Ching discusses the steal beam shapes. His rule of thumb for the W shaped beam is SPAN/20 and grider’s SPAN/15. He explains that composite steel columns are encased in reinforced concrete. Then, he moves on to explain that reinforced concrete beams act together longitudinally to resist applied forces. His rule of thumb for the depth of the beam is SPAN/16. To build a foundation, reinforced concrete columns and beams act together to form a grid that runs across the whole foundation. For flooring systems, the precast concrete units are light enough to achieve efficiency, this provides less depth, reduced weight and longer spans.

In these sections of the book Ching speaks upon masonry bonding terminology, lumber, wood panel products, steel beams, steel columns, concrete beams, concrete columns, and precast concrete floor systems. He starts off by explaining wythe, wythe is a continuous vertical section of a masonry wall one unit in thickness. Also course is a continuous horizontal range of masonry units. A stretcher is a masonry unit laid horizontally with the longer edge exposed or parallel to the surface. Mortar joints are also explained in this section, there are many different joints like concave joints, v-joint, weathered joint, struck joint, and a flush joint. Lumber is used for remanufacturing purposes because of the diversity of its applications. Each piece of lumber has a grademark indicating the assignment stress grade, mill of origin, moisture content at time of manufacture. Next wood panel products are less susceptible to shrinking or swelling, require less labor to install, and make more effective use of wood resources than solid wood products. Steel beams are more structurally efficient wide-flange shapes have largely suspended the classic l- beam shapes. Next steel columns are the most frequently used section for columns is the wide-flange shape. Concrete beams are designed to act together with longitudinal and web reinforcement in resisting applied forces. Concrete columns are designed to act together with vertical and lateral reinforcement in resisting applied forces. Lastly precast concrete slabs, beams, and structural tees are one-way spanning units that may be supported by site cast concrete, precast concrete, or masonry bearing walls, or by steel, site cast concrete, or precast concrete frames. In the other book fundamentals of building construction chapter eight Ching speaks about brick masonry, masonry is the simplest of building techniques the mason stacks pieces of materials like brick , stones, or concrete blocks atop one another to make walls . He also talks about mortar mixes, ingredients, hydration, and the construction of brick masonry. 

Building Construction Illustrated: Francis Ching

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Wood: is a renewable building material that can be easily cut and dimensioned to support a wide range of structural loads. Lumber (wood cut into dimensioned sizes for specific uses) is used as boards, dimension lumber, structural lumber and timbers. Each has its own strength and load requirements. Although wood has its own natural defects (warping, moisture susceptibility and knots) it excels in tension and compression as a structural element. All wood elements such as beams, subflooring panels, joists and posts must be carefully laid out within proper spacing of other members for load bearings.

Wood beams must be spaced between 4’-8’ and be supported by timber, steel or concrete columns. Diagonal bracing and bridging must be used to avoid rotation at intervals in framing. All loads are evenly distributed with the use of a grid system that superimposes all supporting partition and load bearing elements. Wood planks are used as diaphragm reinforcement. Connections used with wood members involve steel plates, bolts, nails, metal straps, brackets and split rings (timber). Some wood elements can be left exposed for its beauty.

Masonry: Masonry brick and glazed tiles are used extensively in cladding on the building envelope. Structural clay tiles are glazed tiles used in areas of heavy wear, moisture problems, strict sanitary requirements, walls and partitions. Different wall thicknesses can be constructed, including cavity walls. Brick is also used for cavity walls, particularly using the running bond method. Standard brick walls can used Common, Flemish, Stack or Garden bonds for decorative patterns.

Steel: Steel is used in a manner like wood framing but with greater strength and no cutting. Steel beams are connected using angles, stiffer plates, bolts and welds. Each contribute to shear or moment resistance. The strength of a connection depends on the sizes of the members used.

Concrete: Concrete beams must be reinforced with steel “Re-Bars” embedded 2” from the surface of the concrete to avoid corrosion. Concrete beams must have reinforcement at the ends connected to the columns, at the bottom across the beam to deter sagging (tension moment) and at the middle top of the beam to prevent a negative bending moment. Concrete columns must also be reinforced with either rectangular or spiral steel inside running along its height to resist bucking. Splices can be used to extend the height of rebar within the columns. All reinforcement steel must start at foundation level and end at the top of column. Columns are laid out in a rectangular grid. Concrete columns can also support timber or steel beams. Precast Concrete slabs, beams and tees can also be used. Advantages of precast elements are less depth, reduced weight and longer spans. These units have a better quality finish and structural integrity.

CHAPTER 8: Among the best building materials is brick. Brick is fire resistant, comes in many colors and is modular (can fit on a human hand). Brick walls can be used along or as composite walls (brick veneer walls with CMU unit as a back up wall). Brick walls can also be reinforced with grout and steel re-bars. Bricks also are made with hollow cores to add grouting and reinforcing steel. Brick elements find uses as curtain walls, cavity walls and decorative walls. Many different patterns of courses can be used with brick walls. The most common, used for cavity walls for its shorter depth is the running bond method. The mortar joints in brick walls play a crucial function to bond the units together and keep water and wind out. Joints are usually 3/8” and Mortar comes in various colors to add to the appearance of the overall wall design. Mortar also comes in various types of strengths, from high strength to low, depending its use and location. Brink lintels can have steel angles, reinforced cement grout or precast reinforced concrete lintels. Brick lintels can span from 4’ to 6’. Brick arches can also be produced. Buildings normally have thicker walls at the bottom and thinner brick wall at the top for load support distribution.

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This reading is about materials, more specifically, stone, brick/CMU, wood, steel, concrete and reinforcement. Brick, stone, and CMU are all examples of masonry. Stone is a combination of different types of minerals and to be qualified as a construction material, it has to have strength, hardness, durability, workability, density, and appearance. Brick is a masonry unit of clay and has multiple ways it can be processed depending on the type of brick is expected. Wood is an easy to work with material and there are two major types, softwood and hardwood. Softwood is from any type of evergreen and hardwood is from a broad- leaved flowering tree. Steel reinforcement is used on concrete since concrete doesn’t handle tension that good. It can also tie vertical and horizontal elements together. When making concrete, it can be molded into various shapes. After 28 days it is placed, it gets tested to see if it is strong enough to be used.

In this weeks reading, Ching went in depth with many of the fundamental building materials we use today. Some of which are wood, masonry, concrete, steel, and stone. Each material has its own benefits when used and some or used instead of others because of there qualities. Concrete is made by mixing various aggregates with sufficient water and is very useful when combined with steel. Masonry is basically stonework and is very useful when stacked on top of each other. Steel has qualities of strength and hardness therefore why it’s used with concrete to make it more preferable. Wood is good for convenience where the material itself is strong, durable, light in weight making it easy to work with. Stone is a combination of many materials and in order to become stone, it needs to meet all these requirements: strength; hardness; durability; workability; density and appearance. As stated before each building material needs to meet certain criteria for selecting the use when building a structure.

According to ching reading, we know many materials in buildings, such as steel, stone, concrete wood.
Steel has many advantages, low cost, sturdiness and easy to change shape.
Stones are divided into many types, igneous rocks, metamorphic rocks, and sedimentary rocks. Used as a wall roof, etc.
Concrete is one of the most widely used materials, commonly known as cement, which needs to be used in conjunction with steel bars.
The wood is light and convenient to use, but it is necessary to prevent natural factors such as water and fire insects.

In this reading Ching talks about different types of building materials. These materials include stone, two types of masonry (brick and CMU), wood, steel, and concrete. Stone is an aggregate or combination of materials. Qualities that it nees to qualify in construction or strength, hardness, durability, workabilty, density, and appearance. They can be classified as three different types: igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary. In construction it is used as rubble, wall panels, cornices, copings, lintels, flooring, and horizontal surfacing.

The next material is masonry and two types are brick and CMU. Brick is made from clay. It has three different types for variation in size, color, chippage and distortion. The three types are FBX, FBS, and FBA. Brick also has different grades for durability when exposed to weathering. SW is for severe, MW for moderate, and NW for negligible. CMU stands for concrete masonry unit made out of precast Portland cement, fine aggregate and water, then molded into various shapes.

The next material is wood. It is very strong, durable, light in weight and easy to work with. The two major types are hardwood and softwood, each are used differently in construction. They way a piece of limber is cut determines its use. Wood needs special treatment against decay and insects. However, wood can have defects that can be natural and/or manufacturing effects.

Futhermore, ths next material is steel. It is the strongest and low cost material there is. When used in construction it needs to be coated, covered, and/or enclosed to become fire-resistant. Steel also comes in many diferent types of shapes for different uses.

Lastly, there is concrete. Concrete is cement, various mineral aggregates and sufficient water mixed together to make the cement set and bind. It is inherently strong, but needs steel reinforcements to handle tensile and shear stresses.

This thus shows how a building uses many materials in order to get its shape and use.

In this reading Ching talks about Materials and properties. Stone is made up of 6 things strength, hardness, durability, workability, density and appearance. Stone can also be used in different forms flagstone, crushed stone, and dimension stone. Ching also talks about masonry. Brick is masonry unit of clay formed into a rectangular prism. There are different type of brick like FBX, FBS, FBA, which vary in size and color for different occasions. There are also concrete masonry (CMU) there cement blocks are really strong. They have a compressive strength of 600 to 1500 psi. Theres also different weight for example normal weight block is more than 2000kg, medium weight block is from 1680 to 2000 kg and lightweight would be 1680 or less. Ching also talks about wood. Wood is strong durable and light in weight. there are soft wood and hard wood  which are the two major classes of wood. typically a piece of wood will with stand 1/3 more force then parallel to its grain. One major thing about would is that it has shrinkage if it has moisture it can expand unto 30 percent but ones is looses moisture it shrinks . this is vary important and must be taken into consideration once applying.  Wood also has things like knots, shakes, checks, pitch pockets, and wane which also play a big part once applying. In addition Ching discusses steel. steel is any iron based alloys there are different shapes they come in. There are W shape, S shapes, C shapes, L shapes, and WT shape. The S shapes and C shapes are American Standard use. Almost all the building around us are made up of steel its really strong and durable. Concrete is made of three important components cement want aggregate. aggregate is basically little peaces of rock, sand , minerals. These things mixed together can make you a solid peace of concrete.  The cement should also be in motion or else it would become a solid. This is why the trucks have the back part rotating as they go on to the site. The cement is always tested. Cement its take into a lab and poured onto a cone shaped container and flipped . They let it sit to see the reaction of the cement if its to much of a liquid it bad if it hardened to fast its also bad it should be just the right amount.