The specialised area „Residential construction“ focuses on industrially prefabricated houses as well as on houses built by craftsmen, e.g. carpenters. Such houses are erected as timber frame structures, solid wood constructions or log homes. New innovative timber construction systems are also used. First and foremost timber construction companies are provided with support during the development of products for the optimisation of manufacturing technologies and for the assurance of predefined quality standards.

Research and development

Development of design

This specialized division places a permanent emphasis on the optimisation of design solutions for residential timber construction. Guiding design solutions are developed on the basis of experimental data and simulations. At present the complex problems in residential timber construction surrounding the design of foundations and connections with windows are under investigation (Project: architecture versus technology)

Development of new timber construction systems

Furthermore, this division focuses on the development of new timber construction systems, the assessment and optimisation of joining techniques and as well as the production processes in residential timber construction.

Quality assurance

We develop quality assurance systems and factory production control systems for manufacturers of wooden houses and for carpentry shops. Tasks include the preparation of quality control manuals, the establishment of quality guidelines and the training of personnel in the plant. Our service and the resulting output is either publicly accessible (project: factory production control for carpentry shops) or it is requested by individual companies or groups of companies (project: Quality assurance timber construction in Lower Austria)

dataholz.com

This constitutes a catalogue of timber building materials, connections and components which provides data on thermal, acoustic, fire performance requirements and ecological drivers. This data is reviewed, calculated or assessed by accredited testing agencies. The technical datasheets of dataholz.com are provided to designer and contractors free of charge and are suitable for submission to building authorities to demonstrate compliance. The service is already offered in Italian and English language versions; a Spanish language version is currently in preparation.www.dataholz.com

Quality assurance in residential timber construction constitutes an essential task. To this end inspections of manufacturing processes and on-site work carried out by manufacturers of prefabricated houses and carpenters are performed in Austria and in neighbouring countries on the basis of:

• ÜA label (Übereinstimmung Austria, conformity Austria)
• CE-mark (e.g. ETAG 007, ETAG 012)
• Quality labels (e.g. Austrian quality mark, quality mark for prefabricated houses, RAL)

We assist manufacturers of wooden houses in the preparation of the statements of conformity for the ÜA-mark and for European Technical Approvals (ETA) and perform a preparatory inspection of the respective documentation.

We perform the system check according to ÖNORM B 3804 concerning the reduction of chemical measures for timber preservation for prefabricated wall, floor and roof components.

Additional services

Expert’s reports

Assessments of errors which occurred during the design, manufacturing and construction phase or of damage during usage are central to expert’s reports and may be in one of the following areas:

• Air-tight envelops
• Roof constructions
• Connections at the foundation level
• Sealing of window junctions

• Condensation and mould

Additional information can be found at:

Multi-storey timber construction

Structural analysis

Building physics

Wood facades / Wooden balconies / Deckings

Constructional wood protection

Windows/doors/(glass)facades

Flooring

Wood-based panels / WPC