FIU's Wall of Wind, supported by the National Science Foundation's NHERI program, tested a full-scale manufactured home today against hurricane-force winds in what researchers believe is the first experiment of its kind conducted at any university in the world.
The pre-fab building was subjected to a range of wind speeds and installation practices used in different U.S. wind zones, the conditions that govern how manufactured homes are anchored everywhere from South Florida to the Great Plains.
Installed to the most rigorous construction practices with steel straps and anchor ties designed to secure it to the ground, it held relatively stable as fan-generated winds reaching hurricane categories.
At less-rigorous code, however the house lifted and rolled.
Researchers will spend the coming months analyzing the data to determine exactly when and how each component performed, and where today's standards leave gaps.
"This has been done for the first time probably, at least in the U.S. and probably in the world, putting a manufactured home, with the proper installation practices in the field, and testing at hurricane-level wind speeds," said Arindam Chowdhury, professor and co-director of the Wall of Wind. "Our facility is the only one that can do these kinds of things under an academic setting."
Roughly 22 million Americans live in manufactured housing, much of it concentrated in hurricane-prone regions of the Southeast where federal wind-safety standards have not been meaningfully updated in decades. The storms hitting those regions have been frequent, extremely damaging and costly.
The gap between existing codes and what the storms deliver is what the test was built to measure. The experiments are led by Elaina Sutley of the University of Kansas, in partnership with Thang Dao of the University of Alabama and Chowdhury, Ioannis Zisis, and Amal Elawady at FIU. The team is testing multiple installation practices from across the country's different wind zones to determine which configurations perform better under extreme conditions, and where current standards leave families exposed.
In the field, researchers can only study manufactured homes after a hurricane has already destroyed them; thus, not knowing the progression of damage leading to failure. The Wall of Wind changes that.
"In the field, we can only see the destruction. After the destruction, we don't know how it happens," Chowdhury said. "Here we are doing it in a much more controlled environment, so we can test various configurations, various installation practices, and then test it at particular wind speeds."
Today's test isolated wind hazard from the other hazards that threaten housing during hurricanes. The next iteration of the research, however, will not be limited.
A powerful new testing facility
FIU is collaborating with several universities and industry to design a wind-and-wave research facility designed to be the largest of its kind in the world and the first capable of subjecting full-scale structures to both wind and water hazards as they interact, the conditions a real hurricane delivers.
"If this home was tested under flooding and wind and storm surge, it might have failed earlier," Chowdhury said. "We will be able to test these under much more realistic conditions to create solutions for resilience."
The data collected today will be analyzed in the coming months and shared with federal agencies and standards bodies responsible for updating manufactured housing safety codes and installation practices.
Hurricane season begins June 1.
