ARTICLE IN PRESS

Journal of Wind Engineering

and Industrial Aerodynamics 96 (2008) 1074–1083
www.elsevier.com/locate/jweia

Internal and net envelope pressures in a

building having quasi-static flexibility and a
dominant opening
R.N. Sharma
Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand
Available online 25 July 2007

Abstract

This paper describes a study on the influence of the flexibility of building envelope on pressures
inside and net pressures on the roof of low-rise buildings with a dominant opening. It is shown that
building flexibility lowers the Helmholtz resonance frequency and increases damping in the internal
pressure system as indicated by the lowering of the resonant peak in the internal pressure admittance
function. Consequently, it was found that the flexibility of the building reduces fluctuations in
internal and net envelope pressures, as indicated by somewhat smaller RMS pressure coefficients
relative to the case of a rigid building.
r 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Internal pressure; Dominant opening; Quasi-static building flexibility; Net pressure

1. Introduction

It is evident from the authors’ personal experiences and other reports that during
windstorms, many residential and light commercial buildings and their envelopes may
respond significantly, and in some instances behave in a dynamic manner. This is more
common for the roof than it is for the walls because of the inherent greater flexibility of the
roof on many tropical buildings. These include the portal frame and concrete wall—
corrugated roofing constructions. An example of the portal frame building is the Silsoe

Tel.: +64 9 3737599; fax: +64 9 3737479.

E-mail address: r.sharma@auckland.ac.nz

0167-6105/$ - see front matter r 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jweia.2007.06.029
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R.N. Sharma / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 96 (2008) 1074–1083 1075

Structures Building (SSB) (Hoxey and Richards, 1995), and the response of its roof during
a storm has been documented on video, which clearly shows the greater flexibility of its
roof in comparison with the walls. The concrete wall—corrugated roofing construction is
common in the Pacific Island countries, like Fiji, in which the walls are extremely rigid.
Lift-off of the entire roof structure in the latter building type is not uncommon. It is,
therefore, vitally important that the effects of building flexibility on internal and net
envelope pressures be properly understood.
Some insight into the effects of building flexibility on internal pressure in the presence of
a dominant opening is provided by the study of Vickery (1986), in which the building
structure was assumed to respond in a quasi-static manner i.e. where deflections are
assumed to be proportional to the applied load at all times. The study was focused upon
the characteristics of internal pressure, but did not include the influence of fluctuating
envelope external pressure. Furthermore, the characteristics of net envelope pressures were
not addressed.
Two theoretical models, those of Novak and Kassem (1990) and Vickery and Georgiou
(1991) have attempted to describe the interaction between a flexible roof backed by a cavity
with openings as simple two-degree-of-freedom systems. These studies were directed at
large span self- or air-supported structures such as arenas and sports stadia. The first
validated the theoretical model with experimental tests on scaled models in still air, in
predicting resonance frequencies and the damping ratios. Vickery and Georgiou (1991)
considered the effect of the wall opening area to the roof area ratio, on the form of transfer
functions and RMS values of the fluctuating roof response. The full characteristics of roof
response and the net pressures were not considered in these studies. Sharma and Richards
(1997) have also presented an analytical model for internal pressure dynamics with roof
flexibility, but which did not include the influence of roof external pressures.
It is the purpose of this paper to address the outstanding issues of the characteristics of
internal pressure and that of net envelope pressures for quasi-statically flexible buildings
with a dominant wall opening. It also considers the influence of envelope external pressure
fluctuations in addition to that of fluctuating external pressure at the opening.

2. Development of equations: the general case

The general problem to be considered is the response of internal pressure to fluctuating

external pressure following a windward window breakage during a windstorm. The
building is assumed to be structurally flexible, which causes internal air volume changes
under the action of both internal and envelope external pressure changes. If it is assumed
that there are no background leakages, conservation of mass requires that the rate of mass
influx at the opening must equal the rate of change of mass of air inside:
d _
ri cAo V j ¼ ðr 8Þ ¼ r_ i 8 þ ri 8. (1)
dt i
In this relation, ri and 8 are the internal air density and volume respectively, c is the
discharge coefficient of the opening of area Ao, and Vj is the velocity of the air jet entering
or exiting through the opening. The first term on the right-hand side of Eq. (1) represents
the compression or expansion of air inside, while the second term represents the physical
change in internal volume. Assuming air density changes to be small, the unsteady
isentropic form of the Bernoulli equation can be applied to a streamline, as shown
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1076 R.N. Sharma / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 96 (2008) 1074–1083

Uh

Instantaneous volume ∀

Cpe Cpi

Nominal volume ∀o

Fig. 1. Sketch for the derivation of the internal pressure equation for a flexible building.

in Fig. 1, connecting the immediate external region to an internal point within the
convergent flow region, Liu and Saathoff (1981), giving
Z
qV dV j qðC pe  C pi Þ 1
dl  Le ¼  jV j jV j . (2)
qt dt ra 2
In this equation, Le is an effective length used to quantify the inertia of the air jet at the
opening, and which is sometimes viewed as the length of an equivalent air slug imagined to
be oscillating at the opening. Furthermore, ra is the density of the ambient air, q ¼
2
0:5ra Ū h is the reference ridge-height dynamic pressure based on ridge-height wind velocity
Ū h , and C pe ¼ pe =q and C pi ¼ pi =q are the (opening) external and internal pressure
coefficients, respectively.
Using Eqs. (1) and (2), and the isentropic gas law for air
pi pe pa
g ¼ g ¼ g (3)
ri re ra
in which pa is the ambient pressure and g the ratio of specific heats for air, and defining the
non dimensional volume change
D8 8  8o 8
v¼ ¼ ¼ 1 (4)
8o 8o 8o
as the ratio of the change in volume 8  8o to the nominal volume 8o , the response of
internal pressure in any flexible building can be shown to be governed by
    
ra Le 8o € gp C L ra q82o  _ gpa  _ gpa
C pi  v_C_ pi  a v€ þ C þ _
v C þ _
v þ C pi ¼ C pe .
2ðgAo pa Þ2  q 
pi pi
gcAo pa q q
(5)
In this equation, CL is the loss coefficient for the opening. From this result, it is not
immediately obvious what the effects of building flexibility are. The equation may,
however, be solved using a numerical technique to obtain the responses of internal pressure
and the flexible structure if the rates of change of building volume are known or could be
related to known parameters. For a rigid building, internal volume changes are negligible
such that v ¼ v_ ¼ v€ ¼ 0; and Eq. (5) then simplifies to
ra Le 8o € C L ra q82o _ _
C pi þ jC pi jC pi þ C pi ¼ C pe , (6)
gcAo Pa 2ðgAo Pa Þ2
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which is a well-known equation governing the dynamics of internal pressure in a single-

cavity, rigid, non-porous building with a single dominant opening (Vickery and Bloxham,
1992; Liu and Saathoff, 1981).
Although for non-rigid buildings it is quite impossible to model the exact structural
behaviour, it may however be reasonable to consider a single component of the building
such as the roof to be flexible. Depending on the degree of flexibility, real structures may
behave in either a quasi-static or a dynamic manner. The first of these simplified but near-
real situations is considered next.

3. Quasi-static structural response

3.1. Governing equations

When the structural frequency of the building components (e.g. the roof) is considerably
higher than the frequencies over the energy containing region of onset wind turbulence, the
structure will respond in a quasi-static manner to applied loading (i.e. to envelope external
and internal pressure). That is structural deflections can be assumed to be linearly related
to the applied loading. Assuming that the flexibility of a typical building is concentrated in
the roof, then the change in (non-dimensional) internal volume and its time derivatives can
be represented by
8  8o q
v¼ ¼ ðC pi  C pr Þ, (7a)
8o kb
q _
v_ ¼ ðC pi  C_ pr Þ, (7b)
kb
q €
v€ ¼ ðC pi  C€ pr Þ (7c)
kb
in which Cpr is the area-averaged fluctuating external roof pressure coefficient, and kb is
the building bulk modulus defined as the ratio of increase in net pressure loading to
volumetric strain. Vickery (1986) estimates the ratio of the bulk modulus of air to that of
the building
gp
b¼ a (8)
kb
to vary between 0.2 for stiff structures to 5.0 for flexible large span roof structures.
Substitution of Eqs. (7a)–(7c) into Eq. (5) and subsequently discarding insignificant
terms yields
 
ra Le 8o ð1 þ bÞ € b
C pi  C€ pr
gcAo pa ð1 þ bÞ
2 2  


C L ra q8o ð1 þ bÞ  _ b _  _ b _
þ C  C
 pi ð1 þ bÞ pr  C pi  C pr þ C pi ¼ C pe . ð9Þ
2ðgAo pa Þ2 ð1 þ bÞ
This result describes the response of building internal pressure to a sudden opening when
the roof structure responds in a quasi-static manner. It is different from the results
obtained by Vickery (1986) and Sharma and Richards (1997) because the effects of external
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1078 R.N. Sharma / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 96 (2008) 1074–1083

pressure on the flexible component have been included. The un-damped Helmholtz
frequency f 0HH ¼ o0HH =2p is readily obtained from Eq. (9)
sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
0 1 gcAo Pa 1 gcAo Pa 1 f HH
f HH ¼ ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi , (10)
2p ra Le 8o ð1 þ bÞ 2p ra Le 8o ð1 þ bÞ ð1 þ bÞ

where fHH is the Helmholtz frequency for a corresponding rigid building. It is obvious
from Eqs. (9) and (10) that increased building flexibility, represented by increasing values
of b ¼ gpa =kb , results in a decrease in the Helmholtz resonance frequency. Building
flexibility also increases the magnitude of damping in the system.

3.2. Admittance functions

The significance of these effects as well as that of including the envelope external
pressure can be understood by examining the admittance functions for fluctuating internal
and net roof pressures over onset turbulence, jwiqj2 and jwnqj2. This, however, first requires
linearisation of the governing Eq. (9), which is possible in a manner similar to that in
Vickery and Bloxham (1992). The linearised differential equation
   
c0 8 ð1 þ bÞ
1
C€ pi  b C€ pr þ j o _ pi  b C_ pr þ C pi ¼ C pe
C (11a)
o0 2HH ð1 þ bÞ gc2 A2o Pa ð1 þ bÞ

contains an equivalent damping coefficient

pffiffiffiffiffiffi c2 C L ra q8o ð1 þ bÞf 0HH y~
c0j ¼ 8p (11b)
gpa

in which
 1=2
2 b2 2 2b
y~ ¼ C~ pi þ C~  r C~ pi C~ pr . (11c)
ð1 þ bÞ2 pr ð1 þ bÞ ir

In the last expression, C~ pi and C~ pr are the RMS coefficients of fluctuating internal and
roof external pressures respectively, and rir is the correlation coefficient between the
fluctuating envelope (roof) internal and external pressures. Due to the complexity of the
problem at hand, the approximation C~ pi  2C pe I u can be applied to obtain a conservative
estimate for the damping coefficient c0j . Here C̄ pe ¼ mean external pressure coefficient at
the opening and Iu ¼ turbulence intensity at ridge height.
In order to obtain the admittance functions, Eqs. (11a)–(11c) are first transformed into
the frequency domain. The final form for the admittance functions jwiqj2 and jwnqj2 are
!2 !2 !2
2 Spi 1 2 2 C pe 2 2 C pr
jwiq j ¼ ¼ jwie j jweq j þ jwir j jwrq j
Sq C pi C pi C pi
! !
C pe C pr
þ 2jwie jjweq jjwir jjwrq j cosðfie  fir þ fe=r Þ, ð12Þ
C pi C pi
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!2 !2 !2
2 Spn 1 2 2 C pe 2 2 C pr
jwnq j ¼ ¼ jwie j jweq j þ ðjwir j þ 1Þjwrq j
Sq C pn C pn C pn
! !
C pe C pr
þ 2jwie jjweq jjwir jjwrq j cosðfie  fir þ fe=r Þ
C pn C pn
! ! !2
C pe C pr C pr
 2jwie jjweq jjwrq j cosðfie þ fe=r Þ  2jwir jjwrq j2 cosðfir Þ.
C pn C pn C pn
ð13Þ
In the above equations
 2  0 2 !1=2
o2 oj o
jwie j ¼ 1  02 þ and
o HH o0 2HH
 
o0j o
fie ¼  arctan 0 2 , ð14Þ
o HH  o2
!1=2
ðo2 Þ2 þ ðo0j oÞ2 b
jwir j ¼  and
ðo0 2HH  o2 Þ2 þ ðo0j oÞ2 ð1 þ bÞ
 0
oj
fir ¼ arctan þ fie ð15Þ
o
!2 !2
2 S pe 1 2 S pr 1
jweq j ¼ and jwrq j ¼ , (16)
S q C pe Sq C pr

c0j
o0j ¼ ; o ¼ 2pf , (17)
ra cAo Le
where Spe, Spr and Sq are the opening external, roof external and onset dynamic pressure
spectra, respectively. To evaluate the admittance functions requires knowledge of the
opening external and roof external pressure admittance functions relative to onset
turbulence, jweq j2 and jwrq j2 , and also the phase relationship fe=r between the roof external
and opening external pressures.

4. Measurement of gain and phase functions jveqj, jvrqj and /e/r

The functions jweq j, jwrq j and fe=r were measured for a wall area equivalent to an opening
of full-scale dimensions 2.25 m  1.25 m, and that for half of the roof of a rectangular 1:50
scale model of the Texas Tech University (TTU) test building, as shown in Fig. 2. The tests
were conducted in a terrain category 2 boundary layer simulation in the wind tunnel, full
details for which will be found in Sharma and Richards (2004). Ten input manifold tubing
systems were used, which have also been described previously in Sharma and Richards
(2004). The gain (or admittance) functions were calculated according to Eq. (16), while the
phase relationship was calculated from the cross-spectrum. The results are presented in
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1080 R.N. Sharma / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 96 (2008) 1074–1083

184mm

Roof pressure averaging area:

138mm x 184mm

80mm

53mm 276mm
Wall / opening area:
25mm x 45mm

Fig. 2. Model details and pressure averaging areas.

10 270
Gain Phase difference (degrees)

1 rq 180

eq
0.1 90

0.01 0
0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10 0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10
Reduced Frequency f Awall / Uh Reduced Frequency f Awall / Uh

Fig. 3. (a) Gain functions jweq j and jwrq j and (b) phase difference fe=r .

100 100
Rigid b=0 |Xiq|2
10 b=0.334 10 |Xie|2
b=1.335
|Xir|2
|Xiq|2

|X|2

1 1

0.1 0.1

0.01 0.01
0.01 0.1 1 10 0.01 0.1 1 10
Frequency f [Hz] Frequency f [Hz]

Fig. 4. (a) Internal pressure admittances and (b) component internal pressure admittances for b ¼ 0.334.

Fig. 3a and b, which firstly shows not surprisingly that the gain functions for the pressures
applied at the opening and the roof are attenuated in the high-frequency region as
discussed in Sharma and Richards (2004). A more interesting result is the phase difference
between the two pressures in Fig. 4, which clearly shows that fe=r ¼ 1801 or p radians over
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most of the frequency range of interest. This simple relationship can easily be implemented
in the calculation of the internal and combined pressure admittance functions.

5. Analysis and results

As an example, consider a building similar in dimensions to the TTU test building,

under the following conditions:
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
8o ¼ 497 m3 ; Ao ¼ 2:81 m2 ; Le ¼ pAo =4,
c ¼ 0:6; C L ¼ 1:2; Ū h ¼ 30 m=s; ra ¼ 1:22 kg=m3 ,
g ¼ 1:4; pa ¼ 101300 Pa; C̄ pi ¼ C̄ pe ¼ 0:57,
C̄ pr ¼ 0:65; C~ pr ¼ 0:17; I u ¼ 0:18
where b ¼ gpa =kb ¼ 0 for a rigid building, 0.334 and 1.335 for two different flexible
buildings. (Values for b have been estimated by assuming roof structural frequencies
fr ¼ 10 and 5 Hz, respectively, with rectangular roof plan area Ar ¼ 127.1 m2 and mass
mr ¼ 3500 kg. The building height h has been taken as 4 m, and assumption of vertical roof
deflections applied. These result in estimates for building bulk modulus kb ¼
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
ð2pf r Þ2 8o mr =A2r or b ¼ o2rp =o2r ; where orp ¼ krp =mr and krp ¼ gA2r pa =8o are the
pneumatic stiffness of the roof with respect to the contained air.)
The gain functions for the pressures at the opening and the roof jweq j and jwrq j were
taken as those measured in the wind tunnel (see Fig. 3ap),ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi with the frequency being scaled
to full scale by preserving the Strouhal number f Awall =U h . The measured phase
differences fe=r were used for the entire frequency range, scaled to full scale up to 10 Hz
(see Fig. 3b). Pressure coefficient spectra were generated from admittances in Fig. 3a and
the Kaimal turbulence spectrum
 2
fS u ðf Þ 105n 2 fz
¼ ; S Cq ðf Þ ¼ S u ðf Þ; n ¼ (19)
u2 ð1 þ 33nÞ5=3 U z U z

with z ¼ h ¼ 4 m. In Eq. (19), Su is the spectrum of wind turbulence, while, SCq ¼ S q =q̄2 is
the spectrum of dynamic pressure coefficient (C q ¼ q=q̄) fluctuations.
Fig. 4a compares internal pressure admittance functions for a rigid building b ¼ 0 with
those for flexible buildings b ¼ 0.334, 1.335. The effects of quasi-static building flexibility
are clearly visible in this plot. First, as the flexibility increases, the Helmholtz frequency
decreases as indicated by the leftward shift in the resonant peak. Second, the reduction in
admittance levels at resonance indicates an increasing magnitude of damping in the system.
These are also deduced from Eqs. (9) and (10). Thirdly, the effect of the inclusion of roof
external pressure fluctuations is to increase the strength of internal pressure fluctuations at
the higher frequencies, in particular, over frequencies in which body generated turbulence
on the roof is pronounced. The latter is confirmed in Fig. 4b, in which component
admittances arising from external pressure at the opening jwie j2 and from roof external
pressure jwir j2 are included. It shows that contribution of roof external pressure
fluctuations to fluctuations in internal pressure is significant about the Helmholtz
frequency and beyond.
The effects observed in the internal pressure admittance functions are also visible in the
plots for net roof pressure admittance in Fig. 5a and net roof pressure spectra in Fig. 5b.
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100 1.E+00
Rigid b=0
b=0.334 1.E-01
10 b=1.335
1.E-02
|Xnq|2

No Opening

Scpn
1 Rigid b=0
1.E-03 b=0.334
b=1.335
0.1 1.E-04 No Opening
Scq
0.01 1.E-05
0.01 0.1 1 10 0.01 0.1 1 10
Frequency f [Hz] Frequency f [Hz]

Fig. 5. (a) Net roof pressure spectra admittances and (b) net roof pressure spectra.

Table 1
Calculated RMS pressure coefficients; correlation coefficients

With dominant wall opening No opening

b 0 0.334 0.334 1.335 1.335 –

C~ pr Influence (Rigid) NO YES NO YES (N/A)

C~ pi 0.23 0.21 0.19 0.20 0.17 –

C~ pn 0.37 0.36 0.34 0.35 0.32 0.17
rir 0.72 0.75 0.79 0.80 0.80 –

These also include plots of admittance and spectrum for a building without an opening,
which reveals quite dramatically, the significant influence an opening and the consequent
internal pressure can have on fluctuating pressures on the roof. Moreover, it is reinforced
that Helmholtz resonance is most pronounced for a rigid building, and that this effect is
moderated somewhat for a building having quasi-static flexibility in its envelope.
The RMS values for the fluctuating internal and net roof pressure coefficients were also
calculated by numerical integration of the corresponding spectral curves, and which are
summarised in Table 1. It shows that building flexibility decreases the RMS values or the
fluctuations in both internal and net roof pressure acting on a flexible envelope. This
confirms the idea to date that building flexibility has a generally damping effect on internal
pressure fluctuations. The significance of the effect of the transmission of external
pressures through the flexible envelope to the inside is also indicated in this table. For
example, for the case b ¼ 1.335, the RMS value for internal pressure coefficient is 0.17
when this is accounted for, as compared with a value of 0.21 when it is not. Table 1 also
shows that there exists high correlation between roof external and internal pressure
fluctuations, and which increases with increasing building flexibility. The calculated
correlation coefficients are upwards of 0.72.

6. Conclusions

An analytical model has been developed for internal and net envelope pressures acting
on a building having quasi-static envelope flexibility and a dominant opening. It is shown
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R.N. Sharma / J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 96 (2008) 1074–1083 1083

that building flexibility lowers the Helmholtz resonance frequency and increases damping
in the internal pressure system as indicated by the lowering of the resonant peak in the
internal pressure admittance function. Consequently, it was found that the flexibility of the
building reduces fluctuations in internal and net envelope pressures, as indicated by
somewhat smaller RMS pressure coefficients relative to the case of a rigid building.

Acknowledgements

The financial support of the University of the South Pacific, Suva, Fiji Islands and the
New Zealand Government are gratefully acknowledged.

References

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