IBHS Research Center Wind Tunnel Tests
The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) Research Center performed tests on structures of identical size and shape but constructed to different building code standards. The test results are truly amazing to watch.
The first video shows a home that suffers an entry door failure. The pressures inside the home build up and the structure suffers a catastrophic failure. This test graphically illustrates the importance of opening protection. Keeping the pressures from building up inside the home drastically improves the ability of a structure to withstand a hurricane. The home that survived in the video was built to current standards with impact resistant glazing.
The second video shows two commercial structures with both suffering glazed opening failures. The structure that fails is constructed without steel reinforced bonding to the tie beam and with only steel reinforced cells at the building corners (not at equal spacing in the side walls). Had the openings been protected by impact rated devices, the wind pressures that caused this failure would not have been able to build up inside the structure in the first place.
The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) Research Center is a unique, state-of-the-art, multi-risk applied research and training facility on a 90-acre parcel of land in Chester County, South Carolina, approximately 45 minutes south of the Charlotte Airport. This facility will significantly advance building science by enabling researchers to more fully and accurately evaluate various residential and commercial construction materials and systems.