In recent years, the use of stainless steel as a construction material is becoming increasingly widespread. There are a number of reasons for this increasing use, including a better understanding of the material, attempts to update certain designs and the conception of a durable and maintenance-free structural material.
In the early days, the use of stainless steel in construction was limited to certain situations where architects were looking for a new material with a special role where no suitable material was previously thought to be available. In fact many of these occasions, stainless steel has been used for a long time and its effect has been a long and continuous washout of stainless steel, so that manufacturers believe that stainless steel materials for outdoor situations even in highly corrosive gas conditions are not corrosive.
The durability of stainless steel and the almost maintenance-free surface are two properties that have led to a greater emphasis on its application than ever before. The prices of most building materials are rising rapidly by some percentage, and many are rising far more than stainless steel. The cost of maintaining and keeping the interior and exterior of a building in good condition has risen even more dramatically. Today’s architects must carefully consider the full range of building conditions. If the building needs to be replaced or repaired over the years, then the architect’s design is a failure.
In recent years the walls of swimming pools have been made of stainless steel. The main material used for a long time, concrete, needs to be repaired and painted every year, especially in the north. Swimming pools built from carbon steel and coated also require extensive scrubbing and painting each year, both of which add up to a considerable expense for the use of the pool. When swimming pools are made of stainless steel (type 304, 2B finish) for the side walls, scrubbing is simple and can be done quickly with water and soap. Today’s swimming pools often have stainless steel trough walls and a concrete mix bottom, which is mainly used to prevent slipping.
The walls of some buildings are made of type 304, mirror-polished grade 8 stainless steel. The interconnecting stainless steel panels are polished and tinted to give the walls a consistent colour and reflectivity. In order to prevent grease, large exposed areas of stainless steel sheeting (velvet feet) are installed in a thick sandwich of galvanised and compressed sheeting. The polished stainless steel sheets are bonded to the galvanised steel sheets with an epoxy resin.
The very soft properties obtained from dry stainless steel make it possible to use it as a roof covering material. It is because this material is easy to form, durable and beautiful, so many architects choose stainless steel not simply as a protective layer, but as part of the overall design.
Some buildings (indoor skating rink pipe) with stainless steel materials to build a permanent flat overlap layer of the roof, not only to make the building from the design point of view of aesthetics, but also because of the reflective effect of the stainless steel surface, so that the indoor skating season can be extended and rabbits to bear the unreasonable investment.
For some special structures, often due to the application of stainless steel so that many difficult problems have been solved. For example, there is a car garage, the design of the parking garage for parked cars not only to have a protective role and the discharge of gas has a good ventilation; but also to enable a certain degree of sunlight into the garage, the choice of materials both durable and maintenance-free. In order to meet the above requirements, the designer chose 6*10in (15*25cm) 201 stainless steel grating, which is fixed to the vertical columns, so that the inside and outside of the staggered resulting in an overlapping layout. To enhance the architectural design effect, the staggered outer grating is finished in a floating finish, the outer rows of column grating are finished in a normal 2B finish, and all the inner grating are finished in 2D. This interlocking pattern gives the garage a lively appearance.
For a building’s roof structure, equal attention should be paid to its longevity and appearance. In the restaurant at the airport, the exhaust fans are covered with stainless steel panels to give the roof an aesthetic appearance. When selecting the covering material, special emphasis was also placed on the non-reflective nature of the material. The village material chosen was type 304 stainless steel, coarsely polished, with a low reflectivity and a grade 6 finish. Particular attention was paid to the choice of finish to prevent the pilot from seeing when landing at his destination, especially due to the glare emitted.
Stainless steel is used in both the interior and exterior of the office hall. Stainless steel is used as a curtain wall for the architectural measures. The columns at the entrance to the building are clad in stainless steel panels and all the windows in the front of the building are covered with stainless steel.
