Cracking in Building

Citation

(1998), "Cracking in Building", Structural Survey, Vol. 16 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ss.1998.11016bae.007

Cracking in Building

Cracking in Building

R.B. Bonshor and L.L. BonshorConstruction Research Communications LtdLondon1996A4, soft bound vi + 102 pp.

Keywords: Buildings, Surveyors

This book is from the BRE stable, where the authors claim over 60 years' experience of research and advisory work, much of it concerned with the diagnosis of building defects, and with their avoidance, and hence it provides the expected useful guidance to where, how and why buildings crack.

Part I: The Science includes a chapter on the causes of size change, one on the mechanism of cracking and concludes with a discussion of joints, their types, and the need to understand inaccuracies in building for the design of joints.

Having set out the underlying science, which we all need to understand before we can start to analyse and diagnose cracks, Part II: Applying the Science includes chapters on temperature, moisture and chemically induced size changes, with pictures illustrating their manifestation, and diagnosis illustrating how to detail to accommodate them. Foundation movement, the other fruitful cause of cracking and distortion, is given its own chapter because a different approach is needed, and the final chapter comprises a few paragraphs on other causes ­ mechanical damage, vibration, indirect causes and frost.

The suggested approach to crack investigation set out in an Appendix is a useful introduction or reminder to all of us.

The book finishes with a bibliography, almost exclusively of BS and BRE publications, a reading list of BRE publications and a comprehensive index.

A detailed perusal of this book would be useful and effective CPD for structural surveyors of all levels of experience ­ it is all too easy to jump to conclusions about the causes of cracks, and we all need reminding of that tendency from time to time.