Point-fixed gGlazing – mMaterials and pProcessing

During the last decades structural glazing became the leading technique in realising building envelopes, especially for larger buildings. Due to the requirements of energy conservation and in order to establish the architectural vision of maximal transparency it became necessary to reduce the number of bearing elements thereby enforcing the point-fixed glazing. As forces are transmitted by plates and bolts in and around a hole, stress concentrates in this area. Therefore in most point- supported glass elements the maximum stress arises at the bore edge. This makes the design of the point-fixing the critical point as glass does not have the ability to plastify and the dimensioning is adapted to the stress peak. A lot of research has been done and still is in progress to minimize this stress by optimizing the point supports regarding their geometry and the materials used. A survey of state-of-the-art constructions and new developments will be given below.