Causes of Cracks on Structures in Ngara-Tanzania英文文献资料.docVIP

Engineering, 2010, 2, 958-961 doi:10.4236/eng.2010.212121 Published Online December 2010 (/journal/eng) Causes of Cracks on Structures in Ngara-Tanzania Fikiri Fredrick Magafu, Wu Li Faculty of Engineering, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China E-mail: fikirimagafu@yahoo.co.uk, lwu@ Received August 19, 2010; revised October 22, 2010; accepted November 3, 2010 Abstract Development of macro and micro cracks on plastered walls and floors have been studied at different sites under site investigation whereby building inspections, construction history, engineering properties of soil and building surroundings assessment were conducted. We did revision of structural calculations and laboratory experiment to find out the source of cracks. Micro and macro cracks have no structural problems on the structure so long as the developed cracks are within the serviceability limit state [1]. There are two main causes of cracks in the structure that are structural and nonstructural sources [2]. The first task was to identi- fy whether the source of cracks are structural or non structural. During site investigation the modes of crack formation, depth and length of crack, crack patterns and direction were studied at different sites in Ngara. Theoretical calculations of crack width and particles size distribution of sand from three main sources were analyzed after performing both sieve analysis and decantation tests. In depth site investigation, literature re- view and laboratory tests result showed that the causes of cracks are nonstructural and all three reliable sources of sand in Ngara contain more quantities of fines than that specified in BS 882. This paper is looking for the causes of cracks on structures and recommending further research on new idea of using simple tech- nology and low cost methods that is affordable by both the government of Tanzania and local community of Ngara to overcome the problem of structures that develop micro and