Wind tunnel study of wind-induced torques on L-shaped tall buildings

L-shaped tall buildings are commonly built in urban areas due to shortage of land and graceful demand of architectural design. In this study, eight L-shaped rigid models with different geometric dimensions are tested in a boundary wind tunnel to study the characteristics of the wind-induced torques acting on L-shaped tall buildings. RMS force coefficients, power spectral densities and vertical correlation functions of the wind- induced torques are analyzed and discussed in details. Based on the wind tunnel test results, empirical formulas which take the buildings' side ratio and terrain category as key variables are proposed for estimating the wind-induced torques on L-shaped tall buildings. A simplified expression to evaluate the wind-induced torques on L-shaped tall buildings is derived based on the proposed formulas and its applicability has been verified by a case study. This study aims to provide a simple and effective way for the estimation of wind induced torque on L-shaped tall buildings.