Folded plate structures made of glass laminates: a proposal for the structural assessment

This paper presents a possible approach for the assessment of folded plate structures made of glass laminates using a new connection detail. Following a brief introduction and discussion of the experimental connection detail, the results of conducted testing are summarized. An extensive numerical investigation using ANSYS is performed. Findings from these numerical investigations of the connection detail, namely a proposed load interaction and the influence of the kink angle on the utilization will be touched on. A simplified modelling procedure for the assessment of a structural system is presented and its results are discussed for a selected configuration. It is shown that the new connection detail is feasible for folded plate structures spanning up to 15 m. The paper concludes with proposing further research and an outlook.