Durability Testing and Reliability Analysis of Connections in Lightweight Metal Structures

在建筑物和桥梁等民用基础设施的设计中，美学和可持续性方面的考虑，如减少用户延迟成本和长期环境影响，越来越多地导致设计师考虑使用轻质金属结构。在材料成本适度增加的情况下，通过使用更耐用的合金和轻质模块化解决方案可以实现显著的效益，这些解决方案可以延长使用寿命，提高预制程度，降低运输和安装成本，并显著缩短建造时间。这些材料还特别适合“解构设计”-这是一个新兴的概念，涉及在设计阶段仔细考虑，主要是通过材料选择和连接设计，如何在结构使用寿命结束时更容易拆卸，以促进更高的再利用率。为了确保实现轻质金属结构在可持续性和社会效益方面的最大潜力，需要进行基础研究，为这些结构开发更耐用和可靠的连接概念。

In the design of civil infrastructure, such as buildings and bridges, aesthetics and sustainability considerations such as reducing user delay costs and long term environmental impacts are increasingly leading designers to consider the use of lightweight metal structures. With a modest increase in material cost, significant benefits can be realized through the use of more durable alloys and lightweight modular solutions that allow for longer service lives, a higher degree of prefabrication, reduced transportation and installation costs, and significantly reduced build times. These materials also lend themselves particularly well to “design for deconstruction” (DfD) – an emerging concept, which involves careful consideration at the design stage, largely through the material selection and connection design, of how a structure can be more easily taken apart at the end of its service life to facilitate higher rates of reuse. In order to ensure that the highest potential is achieved in terms of the sustainability and societal benefit offered by lightweight metal structures, fundamental research is needed to develop more durable and reliable connection concepts for these structures.