ABSTRACT
To structurally design with any material you need to know the design strength and the applicable safety factor. In most materials the design strength is known as the result of testing while the safety factor is selected on the basis of material behaviour and experience with the material. In many materials the strength is actually well known and sometimes the material is identified by its design strength. S235 steel is a good example.
For structural glass usually heat strengthened (HS) or fully tempered (FT) float glass is used. The designations HS or FT however refer more to the fragmentation behaviour of the glass than the strength of the material. Current codes give a design strength for these two groups of materials and a safety factor. On the basis of experimentally obtained data regarding the failure of annealed glass and the variation in pre-stress in HS and FT glass, a new probabilistic approach to determine the design strength and safety factor of glass is shown.
