The overall goals of this project are to develop and implement real-time load and deflection monitoring instrumentation for buildings during construction, to develop an improved understanding of critical construction loading conditions, and to develop guidelines for safe construction practices specifically associated with multistory reinforced concrete construction. The fundamental hypotheses for this work are (1) that the primary cause of construction failures is inadequacy of the temporary support elements such as vertical shores and lateral bracing, (2) that an investigation of load and deflection histories during actual projects can contribute greatly to our understanding of critical loading conditions, and (3) that this improved understanding and invaluable information can be used as the basis for improved construction procedures and guidelines for safe design and construction. In addition to the instrumentation developed and employed, as well as the new data which will be collected, tangible outcomes in the form of design guidelines will include (at a minimum) suggested modifications to current code-specified design loads, improved methods for modeling structural loads during construction, methods for accounting for vertical and horizontal impact loads, and suggested real-time monitoring schemes for excess load and deflection during construction operations.
