When my wife started asking me some questions about what I do, and what I was learning in grad school, I told her about my favorite class at the time, 'Advanced Concrete Design'. What amazed me was how forces, loads, stresses propagate through masses of concrete. Concrete and other mass type building materials are amazingly organic in their load distribution behavior. Looking at water, true Yin, it always flows low- the easiest way- perpendicular to the hardest way to travel. Concrete behaves differently. The hardest, the stiffest parts of concrete draw forces through it away from other areas. When I look at concrete beams, I paint them with flowing lines of red and orange colored rivers of force. Holding the rivers back from exploding out of the sides of the concrete are tight emerald green lines of rebar.
My architect friends like to hide concrete below the ground, behind gyp board and under wood floors. Little do they realize the vibrant colors they are hiding from us.
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