Testing and Characterisation of Earth-based building materials and elements
No project:RILEM Technical Committee TCE
Partners:
2016-2019
Description of the project:The goal of this TC is to define dedicated testing procedure for stabilized and unstabilized earth as a building construction material (crude earth). A good understanding of the earthen constructions requires taking into account their large variability. A first reason of this variability is that the local soils are used as building materials. The local soils are variable depending on the pedology of the site, and the construction of earth buildings cannot be totally included in an industrial process. Then partly to adapt the building technique to the different soils, several constructions technics have been invented, which is the second reason of the variability. Among these technics the four most common ones are adobe blocks and CEB masonry, cob and rammed earth.
Objectives:The goal of this technical committee is to give an objective answer by the definition of performance-oriented tests. These tests should depend on the use that will be made of the material, and their clear definition requires a good understanding of the specificities of earth, as well as the identification of the key parameters which drive its behavior. The objective is to define the minimal number of laboratory tests in order to provide an accurate assessment of the mechanical, thermal and hygroscopic performances of the material. To that aim, whenever possible, existing experienced tests will be used.
Main Activities:Due to the particularities of the material, development of new experimental protocols and/or the adaptation of existing ones may be necessary. These tests procedures and the way to analyse their results will be defined in the view of recent theoretical developments published in literature and/or developed elsewhere by the members of the TC. The behaviour of the material is strongly impacted by the external conditions (temperature and humidity variations, saline environment, etc…). In consequence, the definition of dedicated tests to assess the performance of the material in some specific environmental conditions may be necessary. A main importance will be given to the repeatability and the robustness of the tests. Round robin tests will be performed, and, in function of the obtained results, the experimental protocols and even the nature of the test may be modified. The accuracy of the tests will be studied by comparing, at least qualitatively, their results to the on-site behaviour.
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