Strength and stability - Walls.

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The strength of the materials used in wall construction is determined by the strength of a material in resisting compressive and tensile stress and the way in which the materials are put together. The usual method of determining the compressive and tensile strength of a material is to subject samples of the material to tests to assess the ultimate compressive and tensile stress at which the material fails in compression and in tension. 

From these tests the safe working strengths of materials in compression and in tension are set. The safe working strength of a material is considerably less than the ultimate strength, to provide a safety factor against variations in the strength of materials and their behaviour under stress. The characteristic working strengths of materials, to an extent, determine their use in the construction of buildings.

The traditional building materials timber, brick and stone have been in use since man first built permanent settlements, because of the ready availability of these natural materials and their particular strength characteristics. The moderate compressive and tensile strength of timber members has long been used to construct a frame of walls, floors and roofs for houses.

The compressive strength of well burned brick combined with the durability, fire resistance and appearance of the material commends it as a walling material for the more permanent buildings.

The sense of solidity and permanence and compressive strength of sound building stone made it the traditional walling material for many larger buildings.

Steel and concrete, which have been used in building since the Industrial Revolution, are used principally for their very considerable strength as the structural frame members of large buildings where the compressive strength of concrete, separately or in combination with steel, is used for both columns and beams.

In the majority of small buildings, such as houses, the compressive strength of brick and stone is rarely fully utilised because the functional requirements of stability and exclusion of weather dictate a thickness of wall in excess of that required for strength alone. To support the very modest loads on the walls of small buildings the thinnest brick or stone wall would be quite adequate.

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