DIFFERENT TYPES OF WALLS

DEFENITION A wall is a vertical structure, usually solid, that defines and sometimes protects an area. Most commonly, a wall defines a building and supports its superstructure, separates space in buildings into sections, or protects or defines a space in the open air.

Types of Walls
The different types of walls are, Load bearing Walls Non-load Bearing Walls Curtain Wall (or) Filler wall (or) Screen Wall (or) Panel Wall Partition Wall (or) Division Wall Shear Wall Cavity Wall (or) Hollow Wall Faced (or) Composite Wall Veneered Wall Party (or) Separating Wall Cross Wall Blank (or) Dead Wall Dwarf Wall Parapet Wall Masonry Wall Monolithic Wall Retaining Walls Breast (or) Face Wall

Load-bearing wall
A load-bearing wall (or bearing wall) is a wall that bears a load resting upon it by conducting its weight to a foundation structure. The materials most often used to construct load-bearing walls in large buildings are concrete, block, or brick. Load-bearing walls are one of the earliest forms of construction. Depending on the type of building and the number of stories, load-bearing walls are gauged to the appropriate thickness to carry the weight above them. Without doing so, it is possible that an outer wall could become unstable if the load exceeds the strength of the material used, potentially leading to the collapse of the structure NON LOAD BEARING

Walls that are only intended to support themselves and the weight of the cladding or sheathings attached. Non load bearing walls provide no structural support and may be interior or exterior walls. While non-load-bearing walls can be altered or even removed completely without weakening the homes structure, alterations that can be made to load-bearing walls are limited. May require the placement of temporary supports for certain types of remodeling projects

Curtain wall
A curtain wall system is an outer covering of a building in which the outer walls are non-structural, but merely keep the weather out and the occupants in. As the curtain wall is non-structural it can be made of a lightweight material reducing construction costs. When glass is used as the curtain wall, a great advantage is that natural light can penetrate deeper within the building. A curtain wall is designed to resist air and water infiltration, sway induced by wind and seismic forces acting on the building, and its own dead load weight forces.

Partition wall
A partition wall is a wall for the purpose of separating rooms, or dividing a room. Partition walls are usually not load-bearing.

Partition walls may be constructed with bricks or blocks from clay, terra-cotta or concrete, reinforced, or hollow. Glass blocks may also be used.

MAIN WALL

PARTITION WALL

Shear wall
In structural engineering, a shear wall is a wall composed of braced panels (also known as shear panels) to counter the effects of lateral load acting on a structure. Wind and seismic loads are the most common loads braced wall lines are designed to counteract.

Such walls can be either load bearing or non-load bearing. Shear walls are a type of structural system that provides lateral resistance to a building or structure. They resist in-plane loads that are applied along its height. The applied load is generally transferred to the wall by a diaphragm or collector or drag member. They are built in wood, concrete, and masonry
.

Cavity wall

Cavity walls consist of two 'skins' separated by a hollow space (cavity). The skins are commonly masonry such as brick or concrete block. Masonry is an absorbent material, and therefore will slowly draw rainwater or even humidity into the wall. The cavity serves as a way to drain this water back out through weep holes at the base of the wall system or above windows. A cavity wall with masonry as both inner and outer skin is more commonly referred to as a double Wythe masonry wall.

Cavity walls are primarily built to maintain a dry interior to the building, but also provide other benefi ts, the main benefi ts being: The cavity provides a break between the outer wall of the building which may become damp and the inner wall. Cavity walls provide a better balanced temperature to the inside of the building. The cavity keeps the interior cool in the summer and helps retain heat in the winter.

composite wall
A wall built of a combination of two or more masonry units of different types of materials that are bonded together, one forming the facing of the wall and the other the backup.

Veneered Walls
Masonry veneer walls consist of a single non-structural external layer of masonry work, typically brick, backed by an air space. The innermost element is usually structural, and may consist of wood or metal framing or masonry. Walls constructed in this manner have several advantages over solid masonry
The cavity can include insulation, which is typically in the form of rigid foam, increasing the thermal performance of the wall. A masonry veneer wall can be completed in a shorter time with less labor than a solid masonry wall thus saving in cost. The weight of a veneer wall can be significantly less than solid masonry, resulting in economies in foundations and structural support.

Party wall
A Party wall (occasionally parti-wall or parting wall) is a dividing partition between two adjoining buildings (or units) that is shared by the tenants of each residence or business. When built for this purpose, the builder will lay the wall along a property line dividing two terraced flats or row houses, so that one half of the wall's thickness lies on each property. This type of wall is usually structural. Party walls can also be formed by two abutting walls built at different times Party walls are typically made of non-combustible material. Where required by code, the party wall could be a fire wall. The wall starts at the foundation and continues up to a parapet, creating two separate and structurally independent buildings on either side.

Blank (or) Dead Wall

a wall in which there is no opening; a dead wall or blank wall.

Dwarf Wall
A low wall, not as high as the story of a building, often used as a garden wall or fence.A wall which supports the sleeper joists under the lowest floor of a building.

Parapet
A parapet is a wall-like barrier at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, or other structure. Where extending above a roof, it may simply be the portion of an exterior wall that continues above the line of the roof surface, or may be a continuation of a vertical feature beneath the roof such as a fire wall or party wall.[1] Parapets were originally used to defend buildings from military attack, but today they are primarily used to prevent the spread of fires. Parapets may be plain, embattled, perforated or panelled

Masonry Wall
A masonry wall is a wall made from materials which have traditionally been cemented together with the use of mortar. Masonry walls can be used as structural walls in buildings, and they can also be utilized to create barriers between property lines or different areas on a property. Brick, stone, tile, ceramic blocks, adobe, and glass blocks can all be used in the construction of a masonry wall

Monolithic wall
Monolithic wall, in which the wall is built of a material placed in forms during the construction. The traditional earth wall and the modern concrete wall are examples. The earth walls are inexpensive and durable if placed on a good foundation and protected from rain by a rendering or wide roof overhangs.

Retaining wall
A retaining wall is a structure designed and constructed to resist the lateral pressure of soil when there is a desired change in ground elevation that exceeds the angle of repose of the soil. They are used to bound soils between two different elevations often in areas of terrain possessing undesirable slopes or in areas where the landscape needs to be shaped severely and engineered for more specific purposes like hillside farming or roadway overpasses.

Types of retaining wall

Gravity Cantilevered Sheet piling Anchored

Breast (or) Face Wall

A low wall built to retain the face of a natural bank of earth. a wall built to sustain the face of a natural bank of earth the portion of an abutment between the wings and beneath the bridge seat that supports the superstructure loads and retains the approach.

Breast or face wall is used as a soil gaurds for a sand bank, shore protection, side slope protection, hillside soil gaurd, land slide reconstruction by in an arrangement of slones.