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MODE OF CONSTRUCTION
OF THE WORLDS TALLEST
BUILDINGBURJ KHALIFA
Presented by:-Joji Mathew
Civil Engineering Department
Marian Engineering College(TVM)

Contents
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Introduction
Excavation
Casting of the
structure
Elevators and
escalators
Cladding of the tower
Speed of construction

Wind
Shape
Buttressed core
Earthquake
Evacuation
Environment
friendly

Introduction
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The Burj Khalifa is the ever built tallest

man made structure.
This tower rises in the sky to 828m
carrying 162 floors.
The Burj took 6years for its construction
and was completed in the year 2010.
For erecting this city in the sky several
new technologies had to be used.

Excavation
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The soil stratum of Dubai is very week so

they had to excavate up to 50m deep to
get a hard rock structure
But the rock that they found was fragile
and saturated with ground water
So that any hole made
will be cured immediately

Excavation cont
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The engineers filled this with a viscous polymer

slurry
This pushes the rock and the ground water to the
edges of the boreholes to keep it open
This slurry is denser than water and liter than
concrete, so that when concrete is pumped the
concrete displaces the fluid and forms the
foundation.
194 piles were constructed
for avoiding the sinking of
this structure.

Casting of the structure

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The casting of the whole structure is

mainly done by two materials
1. Concrete
2. Steel
. Over 30,000 tons of steel were used
. About 250,000 m2 concrete was also
used
. The reinforced concrete acts as the
backbone of the whole structure

Elevators and escalators

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The Burj can accommodate about 35,000

people at a time
Consist of 57 elevators and 8 escalators
The biggest elevator carries about 46 people
at a time
These elevators travel at a speed of 35km/hr
The Burj has a service/firemans elevator
which have a capacity to hold about 5,500kg
And this is the worlds tallest service elevator.

Cladding of the tower

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The Burj is claded with high-tech glass

which forms as a curtain wall
If the whole cladding has to be done with
high-tech glass which will cost about 100
million dollars

Test for the cladding against

storm

The cladding should withstand the heavy

sand storms that with in include water and
dust
Prototypes were selected and with the help
of propellers artificially created storm was
allowed to hit the glass panels at
a greater speed
The glass panels
withstands the storm
up to 75km/hr

Glass panel
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The solar contains UV radiations as well as

IR radiations
So that the glass panel consist of two layers
The outer layer is coated with a thin layer of
metal so that it reflects the UV radiations
The inner layer is coated
with thin layer of silver so
that it reflects the IR
radiations

Glass panel cont..

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Arrangement of glass panels in such a

manner will make the building a green
house
The hot air will only be absorbed by the
glass panels and wont allow it to go out
So that air conditioners
were provided for the
cooling of the air and
fresh air

Speed of construction
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As the building has to be built more than

half a km, it had to challenge many factors
that haven't faced by any other building
Has to be completed with in the short
period limit
So the time was money
For erecting such a structure in the sky
steel and glass panels have to be raised
This was done by cranes

Cranes
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The cranes consist of two plates on the

two sides
It could jump from one floor to the
another
So that they were called the kangaroo
cranes
So as to speed up the construction the
RCC walls was done in a simple and
clever engineering way

Casting of RCC walls

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For simplicity and speed the engineers made no. of

steel cages
These cages were inserted to the formworks that
can be moved easily
After installation of cages concrete was filled in
these formworks
Only took 12hrs for the
setting of concrete
After setting the concrete
the formworks would move
to the next level with in 2hrs

Concrete used
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High performance concrete(HPC)

Low permeability
High durability
C80-C60 cube strength concrete was used
It includes fly ash, Portland cement
Two largest concrete pumping machines in the
world were used for this purpose
For reducing cracks due to high temperature
concreting was done only at night
So that air is cooler and humidity is higher with ice
added to the mix

Concrete used cont..

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The pump needs 630HP to pump about

25000tons of concrete
It had took about 14mints for reaching
the concrete to the 150th floor
They completed every
new floor in 3 day

Wind
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Every year the storm attacks Dubai

As the building grows much higher to the
sky the top will be badly affected by the
wind
This causes a sway at the top floors of the
building
So that they studied many other
skyscrapers
The buildings must be in a definite shape

Shape
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They made a study on the Sears tower at

Chicago
The Sears tower had a layer of
steel, and an another layer of
steel which forms an exoskeleton
to the building
9 such blocks were used in this
Sears tower in definite shape
So that the building was made
rock solid

Shape cont.
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Giving the Burj a exoskeleton was not a

easy task
So they designed the Burj in a triangular
shape
So that this was suitable to deflect the
wind to different ways

Buttressed core
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The three wings allow for greater

building height by buttressing one
another by a central core hence it is
called buttressed core structural system
This buttressed core is a six sided
central piece
So that it is called a Hexagonal Hub

Buttressed core cont.

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This hub is surrounded by the three

wings
These three wings afford the torsional
resistance and the twisting of the tower
This hub encloses the elevators

Earthquake
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The earthquake was one of the most

important factor that had to be
challenged by the burj
Any unknown concept would collapse the
whole structure
They took the Taipie101 tower for their
study

Taipei 101
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A year twice China is affected with

earthquakes
The Taipei 101 was raised up with 36
steel tubes
They were filled with concrete for their
rigidity

Taipei 101 cont.

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These columns were holding

together with outrigger trusses
So that these elastic bands
would recover the whole
movement occurred to the
building

Earthquake cont.
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Providing such bands was not so

practical for Burj
According to Uniform Building Code(UBC)
,Dubai was classified under a zone 2a
Moderate seismic activity
The Burj would resist up to 6 in the
Richter scale
Because of the massive reinforced
concrete skeleton

Evacuation
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The attack against the world trade

centre at sept2001 shows the
importance of evacuation in skyscrapers
How tall the skyscrapers grow makes the
evacuation much harder
The Burj is different and have a perfect
evacuation system

Evacuation cont.
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The Burj is naturally fire resistant as the

concrete backbone is already fire resistant
More than that the Burj consist of refuge
rooms
These refuge rooms are made of RCC and fire
proof sheets that resist the heat up to 2hrs
These refuge rooms has a special supply of
air which pumps through fire resistant pipes
There are 9 refuge rooms, one in every 30
floors

The evacuation system

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The Burj evacuation system mainly

consist of 3 components
i.
A smoke detector
ii.
Water sprinkler
iii. High power fans

Evacuation system
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cont.

At first the smoke detector detects the

smoke if fired
The smoke detector then activates the
water sprinkler and then the high speed
fans
As the water is sprinkled the fire gets
extinguished and the high power fans
supplies fresh air by pushing the smoke out
So that it is perfectly fire safe

Environment friendly
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Water heating

The Burj utilizes solar power

378 panels each with an area of 2.7sq.m
were installed
These panels have the ability to heat
140,000 lit of water when supplied with
just 7hrs of day light
This is equal to 32,000KW of energy
provided

Environment friendly
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cont.
Condensate recovery system

Collects water condensate from the air

conditioning system
And diverts it to an irrigation tank
It provides about 15 million gallons of water
per year
This water is used for irrigation of landscape
around the Burj
Reduces water related expenses

Environment friendly
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cont.
Air ventilation

Air ventilation provided at the top

reduces the energy conception
Air at the top of the building is cooler,
has low density and relatively humid
Its ideal for ventilation
Less energy is required to maintain the
comfortable condition

Conclusion
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The Burj Khalifa is one of the unique tallest building

that was built by man
For rising such a city in the sky several new
techniques have been used
The buttressed core structural system has made a
great change in the structural system of skyscrapers
A strong buttressed core will initiate the height of the
skyscrapers
The construction of the Burj Khalifa proves that
height doesn't matter any civil engineering
construction.

References
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Baker, W.F. and Pawlikowski, J.J. (2009)The

design and construction of the Worlds
tallest building-Pushing technology to new
heights, Structural Engineer,Dec., pp. 12-19
Lee, H.J., Kuchma, D.A., Baker, W., and
Novak, L.C. (2008) Desuign and analysis of
heavily loaded reinforced concrete link
beams for Burj Khalifa, ACI Structural
Journal, Vol. 105, No.4, July-Aug., pp.451459.

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Thankyou