Structural Quality Assurance of Wood Light - Frame Construction Subject to Extreme Wind Hazards

The poor performance of wood light-frame construction (WLFC) during recent hurricanes disputed the efficacy of the wood light-frame building process in high wind environments. Deficiencies observed in the wake of Hurricane Andrew (1992) in particular suggest that solutions to the problem must consider human-based factors within the building process. The objective of this thesis is to develop and demonstrate an analytical approach to assess the expected performance of WLFC subject to extreme wind hazards. The approach considers the constructed artifact to be the product of a complex societal process. Aspects of classical reliability theory are augmented with fuzzy mathematics to address uncertainties associated with human factors in the design and assembly of WLFC. Analyses of a prototypical gable roof sheathing system is presented to illustrate the method. A number of expected system performance measures based on individual componentfailure possibilities are examined. The proposed approach demonstrates the suitability of fuzzy mathematics for the performance evaluation of WLFC in the face of uncertainty. Results suggest that fuzzy sets and systems can be used in more general models that explicitly consider the influence of human factors in the building process. Thesis Supervisor: Leonard Morse-Fortier Title: Assistant Professor of Building Technology Thesis Supervisor: E. Sarah Slaughter Title: Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering