ABSTRACT
Sandwich panels became well-established in industrial structures within the last 25 years, because they are light weight, cost efficient and provide a complete building envelope. Usually the panels consist of a thick core layer (30 mm to 400 mm) with a low density in between two thin (0.4 mm to 1 mm) metal face sheets. Two research projects at TU Darmstadt, Germany are concerned with two limitations of common sandwich panels in building industries. On one hand only building cubatures with rectangular or uniaxially curved shapes can be realized with common manufacturing methods. Therefore the feasibility of biaxially curved shapes was assessed. On the other hand common core materials have several ecological problems. They are either petroleum-based or fabricated with binders, which are based on non-renewable resources. Therefore the usability of corrugated cardboard was assessed.
