Defects of tensioned membrane structures (TMS) in tropics

The wide use of tensioned membrane structures (TMS) becomes prominent in many designs because of its aesthetic, ergonomic, and economical nature. Recently, TMS has been applied in the tropics with zone success,fully yet its defects specific to this region have received little attentionhave been hardly specified for this region. Through a questionnaire survey among of 890 uses and technicians of TMS in three different areas in Malaysia, this study identified the most frequently occurringed TMS defects in the tropics, such as "deterioratione of roof coatings", "corrodesion or fatigued in fixings", "fungal decay, mould growth, and dirty in membrane", "corrosion in anchor cables", and "degradation of fabrics". These defects are which were quite different from those in other climatic zones. The top five causes of TMS defects in the tropics are weather, aging, design, construction/installation, and material selection. However, Oonly "corrodesion or fatigued in fixings" is a significant predictor for "deterioration of roof coatings". Though it While this is not a causal effect, in practice in light of this, a practical implication is that TMS maintainers maintenance workers do not have to climb up to the roof to check the deterioration in coating but only need to predict that the deterioration through the corrossioncorrosionde levels in of the fixings instead. Further, seven countermeasures for TMS in tropic were are recommended. This study is the first comprehensive study examining tensioned membrane structure defects in the tropics zone