Interaction Envelopes For Limit State Design Of Chimneys

K. S. Babu Narayan a , Subhash C. Yaragal b, and Yukio Tamura c

a&b

Department of Civil Engineering, National Institute of Technology Karnataka, Surathkal,

PO: Srinivasnagar 575 025, Mangalore, INDIA.
c
Professor, Department of Architectural Engineering, Tokyo Polytechnic University,
1583, Iiyama, Atsugi, Kanagawa, JAPAN 243-0297

ABSTRACT: Chimneys as an indirect and effective means of air pollution control are popular
from time immemorial. Environmental protection agencies have been forced to frame, implement
and monitor stringent pollution control policies. With control regulations becoming more
stringent, chimneys of heights over 400 meters are being erected and used. Design of reinforced
concrete tall stacks for load and wind induced moments by trial and error technique involves
rigorous computational efforts. Availability of interaction envelopes helps reduce computational
time. This paper presents such design aids for tall stacks.
KEYWORDS: Tall stacks, Chimneys, Stability, Interaction Envelopes, Limit State Design

1 INTRODUCTION
Chimneys as an indirect means of air pollution control are immensely popular. Owing to the
advancements in the field of concrete and construction technology RCC chimneys of staggering
heights are being conceived, analyzed, designed, detailed and constructed. The analysis and
design of chimneys as a hollow circular RCC section for combined load and moment involves
rigorous computational efforts by trial and error approach. The problem offers tremendous scope
for computerization and optimization.
This paper presents the development of an interactive user friendly computer package employing
rectangular stress block, for the complex problem on hand. The package has great utility in the design
office for real time design and also for generation of interaction envelopes for use as and when desired.

2 FUNCTIONAL DESIGN
The design of chimney is a two-fold problem of satisfying the functional and structural
requirements. The functional design includes stack height determination, effective height, plume
rise, maximum downwind concentration, plume rise determination, lapse rate, atmospheric
stability, plume rise formulae and wind speed correction. As regards to chimney sizing exit
velocity, base dimensions, exit size (top diameter).

3 LOADS, FORCES, STRESSES AND EFFECTS IN CHIMNEY DESIGN

Chimney is a wind sensitive structure. Its behavior is essentially considered as that of a vertical
cantilever. The loads acting on chimneys are as follows, (a) Self-weight of the chimney acts
vertically downwards. Compressive stress at any section is primarily due to its self weight of the
shell and that of the lining above that section, which depends on the cross-sectional area and the

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density of the material used. (b) Live load: Live load due to the moment of painters trolley and
the men working on it may be taken as 5 kN/m2 on platform used for cleaning and maintenance
works etc. (c) Wind load: The wind load exerted at any point on a chimney can be considered as
the sum of static and dynamic load component. The dynamic component, which can cause
oscillations of a structure, is generated due to the following reasons, (i) Gusts they cause
dynamic pressure changes initiating in line oscillations, (ii)Vortex shedding this loads to
transverse vibration and (iii) Bufetting a down wind chimney can oscillate due to the bufetting
effect of an upstream structure. Magnitude of force exerted by wind is dependent on wind speed,
its fluctuations, Reynold,s number etc.
Static wind effects Wind exerts a static force on a bluff body obstructing an air stream. The
distribution of wind pressure around the circumference of such a body depends on its shape and
direction of wind incidence. Such a pressure causes circumferential bending whose magnitude is
significant for large diameter chimneys. The drag force acting on a chimney, is correctly
estimated by right estimation of drag coefficient which depends on the shape and shear force and
bending moments which the chimney fabric has to withstand safely. The circumferential bending
as a result of radial distribution of wind pressure on a horizontal section of a chimney depends on
Reynold,s number. It is assumed that the along-wind resultant of such pressures is balanced by
the resultant of shear forces induced in the structure and these shear forces, in turn, are assumed
to vary sinusoidal along the circumference of the chimney.
Dynaimic wind effects Dynamic wind problems arise from periodic variations in the pressure
distribution on the shell of the chimney. There are three forms of dynamic action namely (i) Inwind oscillations, (ii) Cross-wind oscillations and (iii) Ovalling oscillations. Ocillations (i) and
(iii) are small and in most cases may be ignored. Model tests show that in-wind oscillations
caused by the oscillating drag force which occurs at around one half of the critical wind speed for
cross-wind oscillations. Moreover they are very weak and easily damped out. Cross-wind
oscillations are by far the most important and any tall chimney should be checked for the effects
of such oscillations. Chimneys, which are of particular concern, are those with low damping, low
stiffness and high slenderness. (d) Seismic loads: An earthquake resistant design essentially
consists of evaluating the structural response to the ground motion and then calculating the
corresponding shear forces and bending moment, which the structure needs to safely resist.
Chimney vibration is essentially a dynamic problem of transient nature. For analysis, chimney is
treated as a cantilever beam with predominant flexural deformations and is analyzed by one of
the following methods, namely (i) Response spectrum method, (ii) Modal analysis technique, and
(iii) Time history response analysis.
3.1 Structural Design Consideration
Among the advantages claimed for the limit-state approach are the degree of safety of the various
parts of a structure is more uniform and that a probabilistic approach to safety is possible. Code
of practice requirements for the design of RC chimneys varies from country to country. Most
countries have regulations for general RC structural work and some of these have particular
clauses relating to chimney design. Some countries like U.S.A, Poland, India, France have
particular codes for RC chimneys. The design is difficult involving lengthy, cumbersome and
iterative computational effort. All codes of practice have recognized this fact and encourage
designers to use time saver techniques like computational algorithm and interaction envelopes to
optimize the structural design of chimney.

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4 PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT AND DISCUSSION

The program has been organized in two phases. First phase of the program generates, values for
plotting interaction diagram. Second phase utilizes values generated for designing.
Phase I: With the cover ratio and thickness ratio as in-put data the program determines for the
given percentage of steel the distances to the designated 73 rows of reinforcement both from the
highly compressed edge and centroid of the section for the given position of neutral axis.
The strains in various rows of reinforcement, the corresponding stress, the contribution of
concrete and steel to load and moment resistance is computed. Thus one point on the interaction
diagram is generated. Varying the position of neutral axis subsequent points are generated, to
complete the interaction envelopes. By varying the percentage of steel set of elegant interaction
curves are obtained to generate a set of 24 curves and for each curve 30 neutral axis positions
have been considered. Interaction envelopes have been generated and presented for thickness
ratio ranging from 0.80 to 0.95. Figure 1 presents the interaction a typical envelope.

Figure 1 Interaction envelope for thickness ratio of 0.85

Wherein cover ratio is (D/D), D- cover to reinforcement, D external diameter, thickness ratio
(d/D), d inner diameter, PU ultimate load , MU ultimate moment, fck characteristic
strength of concrete, p percentage of steel and fy yield stress in steel.

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Phase II: If the user wishes to design a circular chimney section the program receives, cover
ratio, thickness ratio, grades of concrete and steel, external diameter, load and moment
combination as input-data runs the first phase, interpolates the steel reinforcement required to
satisfy the combination of load and moment acting on the section and area of reinforcement is
given as output.
Applications of the Program (a) For generating interaction envelopes for design of chimneys.
(b) To obtain the required area of steel for the given section. (c) For the design of hollow or solid
circular section like columns or bridge piers and (d) With little modification can be used for the
design of pre-stressed pipes and for the design of caissons.
Limit State of Serviceability To ensure satisfactory performance of a structure serviceability
check are needed. Main aspects of serviceability are deflection and cracking. Limiting
deflections is one of the criteria for design of structure and also to limit crack width. A program
is also been developed for computing the deflection of chimneys with height of the chimney,
external diameter at top and bottom, thickness ratio, characteristic strength of concrete and wind
load intensity at every 5 m intervals as input data. New-Marks numerical method is applied to
compute chimney deflections.
5 CONCLUSIONS
From the study the following conclusions are drawn; (i) Availability of interaction envelopes and
computer algorithm immensely help the designer in expeditiously solving the design problem, (ii)
Adoption of rectangular stress block leads to tremendous reduction in computational effort, leads
to slight conservatism which is justified vis-a-vis the time saved, (iii) Distribution of
reinforcement in more than one layer may be considered while detailing, as results are not
affected (iv) Flue openings were not considered in the study for strength, being sensitive to the
position and size, and (v) The program developed can be used in structural optimization exercise
wherein the total cost can be minimized or the ratio of cost to strength or cost to efficiency can be
minimized.

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