Quote:
Originally Posted by PittsburghPA
I was talking to an engineer recently about skyscraper construction and the design of the glass facades and he had mentioned that almost all of the modern curtain wall systems are designed to last around 50 years. If that is true it will be interesting to see what happens when it comes time to replace them.
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I can't recall a single major building in Chicago with a glass curtainwall that has needed to be replaced. Maybe the seals are designed to last 50 years, but glass and aluminum will effectively last forever if maintained. Just look at 860-880 LSD (construction started pre-1950) or Inland Steel (1957). These extremely early all glass skyscrapers are still doing just skippy despite having the most primative glass facades. Post war commercial grade construction is designed to last effectively indefinately.
As is always the case, the key here is to maintain them. 860-880 just had a huge overhaul and I'm sure they've gone through and resealed all the windoes as needed to keep it as airtight as possible.
EDIT: Here's a summary of exactly what had to be done to restore 860-880 LSD. The difference here is that 860-880 has a large amount of exterior steel while newer buildings have none, only aluminum, which means they will not require any of the steel restoration highlighted below:
https://global.ctbuh.org/resources/p...not-enough.pdf