Load-Bearing Capacity of Tempered Structural Glass

This paper presents a method for the failure analysis of structural glass components of buildings. Structural glass is generally prestressed by tempering. In the method, residual stresses are first computed by simulation of this tempering process of soda-lime-silica glass plates using the finite-element method. The model includes both stress and structural relaxations. The edge effects of tempering are modeled. Then, the failure strength of annealed glass is obtained by a statistical analysis of tests performed on small specimens. Loading rate effects are also taken into account. Computational results are associated with the statistical approach for the failure prediction of large annealed and tempered glass plates. This prediction method is validated by experimental results from four-point bending tests up to failure.