Pseudo static experimental study on spider-supported glass curtain walls

Glass curtain walls (GCWs) are among the most commonly used building envelope components in modern buildings, and they can be divided into point-supported or frame-supported GCWs. Much of the current literature on the seismic performance of GCWs has focused on frame-supported GCWs, resulting in a dearth of data about point-supported GCWs. In this work, a pseudo-static experimental study was performed on spider-supported GCWs, a common type of point-supported GCW, with three different types of glass, namely monolithic, laminated, and insulating glass. The damage characteristics and seismic performance of each type of glass and the spiders were studied. For the tested 1.2 m by 1.2 m panels, the ultimate approximate inter-story drift ratios for monolithic, laminated and insulated glass panels were: 1/23, 1/28, and 1/24 rad, respectively. The integrality of the glass panels was believed to be the main reason for different behaviors of the tested specimens. Both monolithic and insulating glass specimens cracked abruptly and ejected numerous fragments onto the ground. The fragments of laminated glass panels would stay attached to the polymer film even after failure, preventing the ejection of fragments. The spiders were found severely deformed when the glass panels failed. More works are necessary to further systematically test and analyze their mechanical performance with more specimens under different height-to-width ratios, interlayer materials, glass thickness, and environmental temperatures.