Application of Glass Failure Prediction Model to Bent Glass Using Finite-Element Modeling

Designers of architectural glass in the United States rely on model building codes and standards for definitions of load resistance (LR) and other factors pertinent to design. Unfortunately, US model building codes and standards currently address only flat glass. These US model building codes and standards provide no generally accepted methodology to facilitate the determination of LT for bent glass. Because architects frequently use bent glass in buildings, a well-defined procedure for determining its LR is needed. The primary analysis tools available to engineers today are based on the finite-element method and can be applied to a wide range of different glass lite geometries. The authors developed a nonlinear finite-element model and applied the glass failure prediction model (GFPM) to the nonlinear finite-element model output to determine the probability of breakage for the specified bent glass lite geometry and the selected load combinations. The results of their analyses compare favorably to the stresses obtained from a strain gauged full-scale bent glass lite test specimen. The authors also compared the LR of the bent glass lite to the LR of a flat glass lite with the same rectangular dimensions of the bent glass lite to demonstrate the strength increase of bent glass constructions over flat glass constructions for the single geometry studied.