Curtain wall facade is being constituted in one of the most used at the present time due to its facility of construction, lightness and to the great variety of materials and finished textures that are possible to obtain.
At the present time the materials more used for the structural profiles in curtain walls are aluminium and steel. These materials have a widely extended use although they often display problems of supply and recycling and bad thermal behaviour.
This project is intended to define a new system and a new nanomaterial to be used in substitution of the steel and aluminium for structural profiles. The developed system must fulfil the same or better mechanical characteristics than the steel and aluminium, must be lighter, weather resistant and with better thermal and acoustic behaviour. The introduction of a new material will also imply a redesign or an adaptation of the rest of materials that compose the curtain wall (joints, silicone adherence, glass, etc).
The materials that will be used for the profiles are polymeric nanocomposites reinforced with fibres and nanoparticles. These materials exhibit several advantages:
- Design flexibility: the composites can be produced with irregular forms and different sections and finishes.
- Lightness: the density of the polymers is much less than that of their competitors (steel and aluminium), what allows the reduction of dead charges.
- Maintenance: they offer excellent weatherability and outdoor behaviour.
- Chemical behaviour: they show excellent behaviour against corrosion because they can be free of metallic materials
- Electric properties: polymers have very low electric conductivity and they don’t show electromagnetic interferences
- Mechanical properties: they show high mechanical performance like strength, stiffness and tenacity
- Fire properties: the use of a nanoclay will provide the composite of good fire behaviour