The materials

In earthquake prone regions, the most crucial factor of the reinforced concrete building’s strength is the reinforcement placed inside its structural frame.

As a rule, in an already built structure the load bearing frame is not visible. Also, during its con-struction phase only the structural members are visible and the placed reinforcement, which is the strength’s decisive factor in earthquake resistant structures, cannot be directly inspected. That factor, which is the most crucial of all, is thoroughly discussed in this chapter. Moreover the ancillary equipment and the materials needed for the combination of concrete and reinforce-ment in order to form the structural frame are also discussed.

The concrete is originally produced as a liquid mixture and can be casted into different shaped moulds. When these moulds are made out of timber, as they usually are, they are referred to as formworks.

In order to secure the reinforcement bars’ position inside the formwork, additional supports are needed. These are called spacers. They prevent the displacement of reinforcement during the casting process and they get incorporated inside the concrete’s mass.

Reinforced concrete is a good heat conductor and since the structural frame has a large amount of mass, it critically affects the building’s thermal-energy efficiency behavior; therefore the struc-tural frame has to be insulated.