Index: Topic Page No
Index: Topic Page No
Abstract 6
Introduction 6
Current Records 7
Construction 9
Wind Engineering 17
Compensation Methodology 21
Vertical Shortening 21
Construction 24
Conclusion 24
References 25
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ABSTRACT
As with all super-tall projects, difficult structural engineering problems needed to be
addressed and resolved. This paper presents the approach to the structural system for
the Burj Dubai Tower. This paper first presents the architectural knowledge and the
comparison of the Burj Dubai tower with other tall buildings of the world. It also
describes the geotechnical procedures and structural detailing of the building besides
the wind engineering applied to the tower.
INTRODUCTION
Burj Dubai (Arabic: " برج دبيDubai Tower"), a supertall skyscraper under construction in
Dubai, United Arab Emirates, is the tallest man-made structure ever built, at 818 m
(2,684 ft). Construction began on 21 September 2004, and the tower is expected to be
completed and ready for occupancy by the end of 2009
Figur
e 1:Impression of Burj Dubai When Complete
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The building is part of the 2 km2 (0.8 sq mi) flagship development called "Downtown
Burj Dubai" at the "First Interchange" along Sheikh Zayed Road, near Dubai's main
business district. The tower's architect is Adrian Smith, who worked with Skidmore,
Owings and Merrill (SOM) until 2006.The Chicago-based architecture and engineering
firm SOM is in charge of the project.The primary builders are Samsung Engineering &
Construction and Besix along with Arabtec. Turner Construction Company was chosen
as the construction manager.
The total budget for the Burj Dubai project is about US$4.1 billion, and for the entire
new "Downtown Dubai", US$20 billion.
CURRENT RECORDS
• Tallest structure: 818 m (2,684 ft) (previously KVLY-TV mast - 628.8 m (2,063 ft))
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• Tallest freestanding structure: 818 m (2,684 ft) (previously CN Tower - 553.3 m
(1,815 ft))
• Building with most floors: 160 (previously World Trade Center - 110)
• World's highest elevator installation
• Worlds fastest elevators at speed of 64 km/h or 18 m/s (59 ft/s) (previously Taipei
101 – 16.83 m/s)
• Highest vertical concrete pumping (for a building): 601 m (1,972 ft) (previously
Taipei 101 - 449.2 m (1,474 ft))
• Highest vertical concrete pumping (for any construction): 601 m (1,972 ft)
(previously Riva del Garda Hydroelectric Power Plant - 532 m (1,745 ft))
• The first world's tallest structure in history to include residential space.
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Figure 2:Burj Dubai-Highest Building In The World
CONSTRUCTION
The tower is being constructed by a South Korean company, Samsung Engineering &
Construction, which also built the Petronas Twin Towers and the Taipei 101. Samsung
Engineering & Construction is building the tower in a joint venture with Besix from
Belgium and Arabtec from UAE. Turner is the Project Manager on the main construction
contract.
The primary structural system of Burj Dubai is reinforced concrete. Over 45,000 m3
(58,900 cu yd) of concrete, weighing more than 110,000 tonnes (120,000 ST;
110,000 LT) were used to construct the concrete and steel foundation, which features
192 piles buried more than 50 m (164 ft) deep.When completed, Burj Dubai's
construction will have used 330,000 m3 (431,600 cu yd) of concrete and 39,000 tonnes
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(43,000 ST; 38,000 LT) of steel rebar, and construction will have taken 22 million man-
hours.
In Burj Dubai, concrete was pumped to the 156th floor, while the remaining structure
was built of lighter steel. Burj Dubai is highly compartmentalised, with refuge floors built
every 30 floors, where people can shelter on their long walk down to safety in case of
an emergency.
Special mixes of concrete are made to withstand the extreme pressures of the massive
building weight; as is typical with reinforced concrete construction, each batch of
concrete used was tested to ensure it could withstand certain pressures.
The consistency of the concrete used in the project was essential. It was difficult to
create a concrete that could withstand both the thousands of tonnes bearing down on it
and Persian Gulf temperatures that can reach 50 °C (122 °F). To combat this problem,
the concrete was not poured during the day. Instead, ice was added to the mixture and
it was poured at night when the air is cooler and the humidity is higher. A cooler
concrete mixture cures evenly throughout and is therefore less likely to set too quickly
and crack. Any significant cracks could have put the entire project in jeopardy.
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Designers purposely shaped the structural concrete Burj Dubai—'Y' shaped in plan—to
reduce the wind forces on the tower, as well as to keep the structure simple and foster
constructability. The structural system can be described as a 'buttressed' core. Each
wing, with its own high-performance concrete corridor walls and perimeter columns,
Each tier of the building sets back in a spiral stepping pattern up the building. The
setbacks are organized with the tower's grid, such that the building stepping is
accomplished by aligning columns above with walls below to provide a smooth load
path. This allows the construction to proceed without the normal difficulties associated
with column transfers.
The setbacks are organized such that the tower's width changes at each setback. The
advantage of the stepping and shaping is to 'confuse the wind'. The wind vortexes never
get organized because at each new tier the wind encounters a different building shape.
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The center hexagonal reinforced concrete core walls provide the torsional resistance of
the structure similar to a closed tube or axle. The center hexagonal walls are buttressed
by the wing walls and hammerhead walls, which behave as the webs and flanges of a
beam to resist the wind shears and moments. Outriggers at the mechanical floors allow
the columns to participate in the lateral load resistance of the structure; hence, all of the
vertical concrete is utilized to support both gravity and lateral loads. The wall concrete
specified strengths ranged from C80 to C60 cube strength and utilized Portland cement
and fly ash. Local aggregates were utilized for the concrete mix design. The C80
concrete for the lower portion of the structure had a specified Young's elastic modulus
of 43 800 N/mm2 (6350 ksi) at 90 days. The wall and column sizes were optimized
using virtual work/LaGrange multiplier methodology, which results in a very efficient
structure. The reinforced concrete structure was designed in accordance with the
requirements of ACI 318-02 Building Code Requirements for Structural Concrete.
The wall thicknesses and column sizes were fine tuned to reduce the effects of creep
and shrinkage on the individual elements which compose the structure. To reduce the
effects of differential column shortening, due to creep, between the perimeter columns
and interior walls, the perimeter columns were sized such that the self-weight gravity
stress on the perimeter columns matched the stress on the interior corridor walls. The
five sets of outriggers, distributed up the building, tie all the vertical load- carrying
elements together, further ensuring uniform gravity stresses, hence reducing differential
creep movements. Since the shrinkage in concrete occurs more quickly in thinner walls
or columns, the perimeter column thickness of 600 mm (24 in.) matched the typical
corridor wall thickness (similar volume-to-surface ratios) (Figure 4b) to ensure the
columns and walls will generally shorten at the same rate due to concrete shrinkage.
The top section of the tower consists of a structural steel spire utilizing a diagonally
braced lateral system. The structural steel spire was designed for gravity, wind, seismic
and fatigue in accordance with the requirements of AISC Load and Resistance Factor
Design Specification for Structural Steel Buildings (1999). The exterior exposed steel is
protected with a flame-applied aluminum finish.
The structure was analyzed for gravity (including P-A analysis), wind, and seismic loads
using ETABS version 84. The three-dimensional analysis model consisted of the
reinforced concrete walls, link beams, slabs, raft, piles, and the spire structural steel
system (Figure 4).
The reinforced concrete structure was designed in accordance with the requirements of
ACI 318-02 (American Concrete Institute) Building Code Requirements for Structural
Concrete.
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Th
e Dubai Municipality (DM) specifies Dubai as a UBC97 Zone 2a seismic region (with a
(a)
(b)
Figure 4. Three-dimensional analysis model. (a) 3D view of analysis model.
(b) 3D view of single story
seismic zone factor Z = 015 and soil profile Sc). The seismic analysis consisted of a
site-specific response spectra analysis. Seismic loading typically did not govern the
design of the reinforced concrete tower structure. Seismic loads did govern the design
of the reinforced concrete podium buildings and the tower structural steel spire.
Dr Max Irvine (with Structural Mechanics & Dynamics Consulting Engineers located in
Sydney, Australia) developed site-specific seismic reports for the project, including a
seismic hazard analysis. The potential for liquefaction was investigated based on
several accepted methods; it was determined that liquefaction is not considered to have
any structural implications for the deep-seated tower foundations.
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constructed in four separate pours (three wings and the center core). Each raft pour
occurred over at least a 24-hour period. Reinforcement was typically at 300 mm spacing
in the raft, and arranged such that every 10th bar in each direction was omitted,
resulting in a series of 'pour enhancement strips' throughout the raft at which 600 mm x
600 mm openings at regular intervals facilitated access and concrete placement.
The tower raft is 3.7 m (12 ft) thick and therefore, in addition to durability, limiting peak
temperature was an important consideration. The 50 MPa raft mix incorporated 40% fly
ash and a water cement ratio of 0-34. Giant placement test cubes of the raft concrete,
3.7 m (12 ft) on a side (Figure 7) were test poured to verify the placement procedures
and monitor the concrete temperature rise.
The tower raft is supported by 194 bored cast-in-place piles. The piles are 15 m in
diameter and approximately 43 m long, with a design capacity of 3000 tonnes each. The
tower pile load test supported over 6000 tonnes (Figure 9). The C60 (cube strength)
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SCC concrete was placed by the tremie method utilizing polymer slurry. The friction
piles are supported in the naturally cemented calcisilt-ite/conglomeritic calcisiltite
formations, developing an ultimate pile skin friction of 250-350 kPa (2-6-3-6 tons/ft2).
When the rebar cage was placed in the piles, special attention was paid to orient the
rebar cage such that the raft bottom rebar could be threaded through the numerous pile
rebar cages without interruption, which greatly simplified the raft construction.
^ Phase 3: six boreholes (two with pressure meter testing) with depths up to 60m.
^ Phase 4: one borehole with cross-hole and down-hole geophysics; depth = 140 m.
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A detailed 3D foundation settlement analysis was carried out (by Hyder Consulting Ltd,
Figure 9. Test pile (6000 tonnes)
Figure 7. SCC concrete flow table testing Figure 8. Raft concrete placement
test cubes
UK) based on the results of the geotechnical investigation and the pile load test results.
It was determined the maximum long-term settlement over time would be about a
maximum of 80 mm (3.1 in.). This settlement would be a gradual curvature of the top of
grade over the entire large site. When the construction was at Level 135, the average
foundation settlement was 30 mm (1.2 in.).
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incorporating a viscosity-modifying admixture with a slump flow of 675 ± 75 mm to limit
the possibility of defects during construction.
Owing to the aggressive conditions present due to the extremely corrosive ground
water, a rigorous program of anti-corrosion measures was required to ensure the
durability of the foundations. Measures implemented included specialized waterproofing
systems, increased concrete cover, the addition of corrosion inhibitors to the concrete
mix, stringent crack control design criteria, and an impressed current cathodic protection
system utilizing titanium mesh (Figure 10).
WIND ENGINEERING
For a building of this height and slenderness, wind forces and the resulting motions in
the upper levels become dominant factors in the structural design. An extensive
program of wind tunnel tests and other studies were undertaken (Figure 11). The wind
tunnel program included rigid-model force balance tests, full multi-degree of freedom
CROSS WINOMQTJQW
Figure 11. Aeroelastic wind tunnel model
Figure 12. Vortex shedding behavior
aeroelastic model studies, measurements of localized pressures, pedestrian wind
environment studies, and wind climatic studies. Wind tunnel models account for the
cross-wind effects of wind-induced vortex shedding on the building (Figure 12). The
aeroelastic and force balance studies used models mostly at 1 : 500 scale.
To determine the wind loading on the main structure, wind tunnel tests were undertaken
early in the design using the high-frequency force-balance technique. The wind tunnel
data were then combined with the dynamic properties of the tower in order to compute
the tower's dynamic response and the overall effective wind force distributions at full
scale. For the Burj Dubai the results of the force balance tests were used as early input
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for the structural design and detailed shape of the tower and allowed parametric studies
to be undertaken on the effects of varying the tower's stiffness and mass distribution.
The building has essentially six important wind directions. The principal wind directions
are when the wind is blowing into the 'nose'/'cutwater' of each of the three wings (Nose
A, Nose B, and Nose C). The other three directions are when the wind blows in between
two wings, termed the 'tail' directions (Tail A, Tail B, and Tail C). It was noticed that the
force spectra for different wind directions showed less excitation in the important
frequency range for winds impacting the pointed or nose end of a wing (Figure 13) than
from the opposite direction (tail). This was borne in mind when selecting the orientation
of the tower relative to the most frequent strong wind directions for Dubai and the
direction of the set backs.
Several rounds of force balance tests were undertaken as the geometry of the tower
evolved and was refined architecturally. The three wings set back in a clockwise
sequence, with the A wing setting back first. After each round of wind tunnel testing, the
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motions are within the ISO standard recommended values without the need for auxiliary
damping.
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with additional equations to incorporate the effects of reinforcement and complex
loading history .
Long-term creep and shrinkage testing, over one year in duration, have been performed
by the CTL Group (located in Skokie, IL, USA), under contract with Samsung, on
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concrete specimens to better understand the actual behavior of the concrete utilized for
the project.
Compensation methodology
The tower is being constructed utilizing both a vertical and horizontal compensation
program. For vertical compensation, each story is being constructed incorporating a
modest increase in the typical floor-to-floor height.
For horizontal compensation, the building is being 'recentered' with each successive
center hex core jump. The recentering compensation will correct for all gravity-induced
sidesway effects (elastic, differential foundation settlement, creep, and shrinkage) which
occur up to the casting of each story.
Vertical shortening
Based on the procedures presented above, the predicted time-dependent vertical
shortening of the center of the core can be determined at each floor of the Burj Dubai
tower (Figure 15), not accounting for foundation settlements. The total predicted vertical
shortening of the walls and columns at the top of the concrete core, subsequent to
casting, is offset by the additional height added by the increased floor-to-floor height
compensation program.
Due to the compatibility requirements of strain between the rebar and the concrete in a
reinforced concrete column, as the concrete creeps and shrinks, i.e., shortens, the rebar
must attract additional compressive stress and forces to maintain the same strain as the
concrete. Since the total load is the same, over time part of the load in a reinforced
concrete column is transferred from the concrete to the rebar. This un-loading of the
concrete, therefore, also reduces the creep in the concrete (less load results in less
creep). As per Figure 16, the rebar in the columns and walls (with a rebar-to-concrete
area ratio of about 1%) at Level 135 supports about 15% of the load at the completion
of construction and the concrete supports 85%. However, after 30 years, the rebar
supports 30% of the total load and
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the concrete supports 70%. This percent increase in force carried by the rebar
increases as the steel rho is increased and/or as the total load decreases.
Construction sequence
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The gravity sidesway can be thought of as the difference between the vertical
shortening at the extreme ends of the building causing curvature which is integrated
along the height of the structure. Concrete creep and shrinkage properties are variable.
Taking the difference between two variable numbers results in a value which has an
even greater variability; hence, prediction of gravity-induced horizontal sidesway is more
of an estimate than the prediction of vertical shortening alone.
Based on the construction sequence, time step, elastic, creep, shrinkage, and
foundation settlement analysis, predictions of the Burj Dubai tower gravity-induced
horizontal sidesway have been made.
Ensuring pumpability to reach world record heights is probably the most difficult
concrete design issue, particularly considering the high summer temperatures. Four
separate basic mixes have been developed to enable reduced pumping pressure as the
building gets higher. A horizontal pumping trial equivalent to the pressure loss in
pumping to a height of 600 m (1970 ft) was conducted in February 2005 to determine
the pumpability of these mixes and establish the friction coefficients.
The current concrete mix contains 13% fly ash and 10% silica fume with a maximum
aggregate size of 20 mm (3/4 in.). The mix is virtually self-consolidating with an average
slump flow of approximately 600 mm (24 in.), and will be used until the pumping
pressure exceeds approximately 200 bar.
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CONSTRUCTION
The Burj Dubai utilizes the latest advancements in construction techniques and material
technology. The walls are formed using Doka's SKE 100 automatic self-climbing
formwork system (Figure 19). The circular nose columns are formed with steel forms,
and the floor slabs are poured on MevaDec formwork. Wall reinforcement is
prefabricated on the ground in 8 m sections to allow for fast placement.
The construction sequence for the structure has the central core and slabs being cast
first, in three sections; the wing walls and slabs follow behind; and the wing nose
columns and slabs follow behind these (Figure 1). Concrete is pumped via specially
developed Putzmeister pumps, able to pump to heights of 600 m (1970 ft) in a single
stage and generate 350 bar pressure.
CONCLUSION
When completed, the Burj Dubai Tower will be the world's tallest structure. It represents
a significant achievement in terms of utilizing the latest design, materials, and
construction technology and methods, in order to provide an efficient, rational structure
to rise to heights never before seen.
REFERENCES
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William F. Baker, D.Stanton Korista and Lawrence C. Novak (2007).
Burj Dubai: Engineering The Worlds Tallest Building,
November 2007
www.Wikipedia.com
Burj_Dubai
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burj_Dubai
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