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From ABC News:
The list of high-rise apartment towers in Britain that have failed fire safety tests grew to 60, officials said Sunday, revealing the mounting challenge the government faces in the aftermath of London's Grenfell Tower fire tragedy.
All of the buildings for which external cladding samples were so far submitted failed combustibility tests, Communities Secretary Sajid Javid said. As of late Sunday, that includes 60 towers from 25 different areas of the country — double the figure given a day earlier.
More from the BBC:
The Local Government Association said some councils have introduced 24-hour warden patrols to mitigate the risk before cladding is removed.
It said in a statement: "Where cladding fails the test, this will not necessarily mean moving residents from tower blocks.
"In Camden, the decision to evacuate was based on fire inspectors' concerns about a combination of other fire hazards together with the cladding."
So it looks like, far from an isolated thing, basically everyone had the bright idea to do this.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 26 2017, @09:44AM (5 children)
Actually, I think they use aluminum studs, rather than steel. Or, that's what I've seen. Maybe it's just the area I live in? Steel may be more popular in other areas?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday June 26 2017, @02:06PM (2 children)
I did some googling because the concept is interesting and I don't think those exist. You can go to images.google.com and search for aluminum studs and you'll get all these pictures of galvanized steel studs sometimes from the manufacturer or distributor website which is pretty funny.
I'm not seeing the higher price in exchange for lighter weight selling very well for building construction. Thats a good tradeoff for an aircraft or maybe a boat, but not buildings.
I would imagine if you can find a way to start a fire in a brick/steel/plaster/granite house (what exactly will burn? The carpet? Wood flooring material?) then aluminum would melt too easily so it wouldn't be allowed. I know from casting aluminum at home that if you heat up a piston or whatever long before it melts it loses most of its strength and a hammer will break it into bits quite easily.
Something I have always wondered about steel studs, having never used them, is its hard to destroy wiring by pulling it thru a wooden hole unless you're really screwing something up, but I imagine the sharp edges of steel studs makes pulling cable rather difficult without destroying the insulation.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 26 2017, @02:29PM
As always, it depends on local codes, but I expect most would forbid pulling NM cable through steel studs for precisely this reason.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Kymation on Monday June 26 2017, @05:33PM
There are plastic snap-in bushings that protect the cable where it penetrates a steel stud. These are required by the National Electric Code in the USA, and probably similar codes in other countries.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday June 26 2017, @02:46PM (1 child)
Citation needed; I think you're just mistaken, perhaps because steel studs are so light. Steel studs are light because they're super-thin; they're not meant to support any kind of load at all, except for the drywall that's screwed to them. There's no possible reason to use aluminum for any building on land for this purpose; steel is much cheaper and probably works much better too (sheet aluminum isn't very good for screwing things into, the screws will just pull through; when you do screw things into aluminum, it's generally rather thick or a high-grade alloy).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 26 2017, @03:17PM
In 1991, I had a house built in Canada and for the finished basement, the contractor used aluminum studs to hang the drywall on for the interior walls. Before doing so, he asked my permission and after confirming there would be no upcharge, I agreed and he used the aluminum studs. I don't know why he wanted to use aluminum studs. Maybe he had some left over from a previous job? Anyway, they worked fine, the drywall stayed up and we had no problems.