Limestone Burst Prefabricated House Panels
"Limestone burst prefabricated house panels" is not a professional term. It is speculated to refer to damage or collapse of prefabricated panel houses in areas such as limestone mine residential communities, which is mainly related to the characteristics of the prefabricated panel houses themselves and various influencing factors.
Structural Defects of Prefabricated Panel Houses
Prefabricated panel houses have extremely poor earthquake resistance and may directly collapse during an earthquake. Their overall integrity is poor. When subjected to horizontal forces such as earthquakes, the floor slabs and walls are prone to separation, and the collapse is often very sudden without any crack warnings or deformation buffers. At the same time, the connection points of prefabricated panel houses are very fragile. The prefabricated panels and walls usually only have simple overlaps, and the gaps between the panels are simply filled without reinforcing structures such as ring beams and structural columns. Once there is foundation settlement or wall cracking, it will cause the panels to shift and loosen. Over time, the connections will also weather, the steel bars will rust, and the strength will decrease, which can easily trigger a chain collapse. In addition, shoddy materials are common in prefabricated panels, which are brittle and prone to breakage. The steel bars in regular prefabricated panels are relatively thin, while some small workshops may use thin steel wires instead. Problems such as non-compliant concrete grades and insufficient thickness also occur frequently. When the load-bearing capacity is exceeded, the prefabricated panels will break instantly without any warning.
Influence of External Factors
During long-term use, houses are affected by various factors such as natural aging, house modifications, and overloading. For example, the prefabricated panel buildings in the Sutie Community at Hemenkou, Xiqu District, Panzhihua City, which are located in a limestone mine residential area, were built a long time ago and have experienced problems such as roof leaks, peeling and cracking of exterior wall finishes, foundation settlement, and severe rusting of cast-iron sewer pipes in indoor toilets and kitchens. The emergence of these problems not only affects the normal lives of residents but also further weakens the structural safety of the houses, increasing the risk of damage or even collapse of the prefabricated panels. Some actual accidents also confirm this. For example, the collapse of the Juxian Restaurant in Chenzhuang Village, Taosi Township, Xiangfen County, Linfen City, Shanxi Province in 2020 was partly due to the poor overall integrity of the building structure and severe overloading of the load-bearing brick columns and the roof of the north building's second floor. The collapse of the auxiliary building on Youche Road, Songling Sub-district, Wujiang District, Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province in 2021 was directly caused by the blind removal of load-bearing walls without any reinforcement or safety measures.
