Search results for "Natural materials"
showing 6 items of 16 documents
The cork viewed from the inside
2015
International audience; Cork is the natural material stripped from the outer bark of cork oak. It is still the most used stopper to seal wine bottles and to preserve wine during storage. Cork stoppers are sorted in different classes according to apparent defects, named lenticels, which can be related to the cork macroporosity. The more lenticels there are, the worst cork quality is. The present work aims at investigating defects analysis of cork stoppers from two classes by comparing images recorded by digital photography and neutron imaging. Surface analysis of defects obtained from photography leads to more surface defects in class 4 (6.7%) than in class 0 (4.1%). Neutron radiography and …
Controlling Thermal Flows through Natural Materials in Building Construction Sector
2019
Nowadays, the attention about the building sustainability is increasingly emerging, because of the major responsibility of the building field on the environmental degradation: both in terms of energy consumption from non-renewable sources and the raw materials impoverishment. In addition, the level of comfort required by users is growing and the thermal insulation of buildings becomes the key element for the reduction of energy consumption and CO2 emissions, both in the case of new construction and of the existing ones. The heat load of a building depends on the presence of insulating material which defines the performance of the building envelope. The main purpose of this work is both to i…
Bending test for capturing the vivid behavior of giant reeds, returned through a proper fractional visco-elastic model
2015
Abstract This paper presents results of experimental investigations made to evaluate the vivid behavior of giant reed Arundo donax. In particular, attention was paid to the relationship between visco-elastic properties and moisture content, which is widely recognized as one of the key factor that influences the mechanical properties of all wood-based materials. To this aim, after a controlled drying treatment on samples of reed, stress relaxation tests in three point bending configuration were performed to evaluate the effects of moisture content on visco-elastic behavior of the giant reed. Further, the novel aspect of this paper is that of using an Euler–Bernoulli model embedded with an ad…
Composite Building Materials: Thermal and Mechanical Performances of Samples Realized with Hay and Natural Resins
2017
Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu MdM-2015-0552 Recent years have seen an increasing public interest in issues related to energy saving and environmental pollution reduction in the building sector. As a result, many directives have been issued, the most important being the Directive 2010/31/EU (EPBD Recast) on the energy performance of buildings, which requires that "Member States shall ensure that by 31 December 2020 all new buildings are nearly zero-energy buildings". This goal can be obtained not only by reducing energy demand for heating and cooling, but also, for example, by improving building envelope performances. In this work, a first analysis of the thermal and structural behavi…
Layered dry envelope insulated with sheep wool-lime mix
2014
This poster describes the results of a research aimed to design and assess a new layered envelope component that might be implemented on buildings of the Mediterranean area, in order to improve the energy efficiency and the environmental sustainability. These goals have been achieved by means of the use of local and natural building materials or arising from renewable resources. In particular, thermal insulating has been realize utilizing a mix of natural and mineral materials, obtaining a biocomposite with comparable building physics and mechanical properties to commonly used building materials. Among natural materials, the sheep wool was chosen since it is, on the hand, a waste to exploit…
Glass-basalt/epoxy hybrid composites for marine applications
2011
Abstract The aim of this work is to evaluate the influence of uniaxial basalt fabric layers on the mechanical performances of a glass mat/epoxy composite used for marine applications. Polymer composites, reinforced by glass mat (GFRP), and hybrid ones, reinforced by glass mat and unidirectional basalt fabric, have been produced by vacuum bagging technique. Three points bending and tensile tests have been carried out in order to evaluate the effect of number and position of basalt layers on the mechanical properties of the investigated structures. The experimental tests have showed that the presence of two external layers of basalt involves the highest increase in mechanical properties of hy…