I chose a reinforced concrete structural system for my building, as concrete as a popular building material in Enugu, where my site is located. I have timber trusses to support the shed roof of my building.
My system consists of mainly beams, columns, and two slabs for the floors of the building. The entire site will repeat this structure 4 times, but the structure will remain the same across all buildings. I chose to use columns and beams because the walls in my building have a lot of openings to enable natural ventilation, as can be seen in the diagram below. The wall could not be load bearing, which mean columns and beams would be needed to support the structure.
One particular challenge was creating a structural system to support the shed roof that is going across the footprint of the building. This was made possible by creating custom timber trusses that will sit on top of the concrete beams on the second floor. Timber is a locally available material, so it made sense to have this play a role in my structural system. Additionally, I plan to have a light weight shed roof, which eliminates the need for a more heavy duty truss made of steel.
A section of the timber framing system is below:
