Stefanie Rolfsmeier
Year:
2019
Bibliographic info:
11th International BUILDAIR Symposium, 24- 25 May 2019, Hannover, Germany

Purpose of the work

This paper presents the challenges of conducting air permeability measurements in very densely constructed buildings and apartments.

Content of the contribution

The trend in Germany and in some neighboring countries is towards increasingly densely constructed buildings. Furthermore, a growing number of individual apartments are being measured. We note that measurement engineers are confronted with new challenges when conducting air permeability measurements: Patience and an awareness of the conditions are needed. Various factors, like high airtightness, wind influence, exposed vapor barrier sheeting as well as, in the case of apartments, additional flow paths to other zones via internal leakages and ducts, will be explained in this paper. To round the paper off, suggestions and solutions are presented on how to deal in practice with the changed measurement conditions.

Conclusions

Conducting an air permeability measurement can be influenced or "impaired" by various factors, like airtightness, wind conditions and building envelope material. If these influences are known, the measurement procedure can be specially adapted to address problematic constraints and conditions and a measurement campaign can be successfully completed.

Note

For more information, please contact the reference author at: rolfsmeier@blowerdoor.de