Selahattin Ersoy

This study investigates daylight performance in relation to the orientation of the “sofa” (living room in a traditional Turkish house) within a digital environment, aiming to identify the advantages and disadvantages of different orientations through quantitative analysis. Natural daylight has long been a critical design criterion in architecture, with building orientation directly influencing interior illumination. In traditional Turkish houses, room positioning was carefully arranged to maximize daylight, and the sofa, used as a socializing and seating area, often received special attention in window design compared to other rooms. The research focuses on the ‘Bey Sokak’ district in Tokat, which preserves the city’s traditional fabric and includes many examples of civil architecture. Daylight analysis was conducted using the Grasshopper program at 09:00, 12:00, 15:00, and 18:00 on September 21st, December 21st, June 21st, and March 21st. Orientations of 0°, 45°, 90°, 135°, 180°, 225°, and 315° were examined, with the sofa positioned 5° north of alignment. Findings indicate that the 315° (southeast) orientation provides notable benefits. It enhances morning performance, improves uniformity, and offers potential energy efficiency, making it particularly effective for early daylight use. However, limitations include insufficient afternoon light, reduced winter performance, and brightness issues. Overall, the study highlights the significant impact of orientation on daylight performance in traditional Turkish houses. While the 315° orientation demonstrates clear advantages, its drawbacks emphasize the need for balanced design strategies that consider both seasonal and daily variations in natural light.

Atranos Castle is an early Byzantine heritage founded by the emperor Hadrianus in the second century in Orhaneli, a district south of Bursa with mountainous geography. Two towers of the castle survived in partial to date. About 5m long main wall foundation and two more towers’ base were also identified during field study. The survey of the castle remains was done by use of a laser scanner and drone to reveal its disappearing cultural and archeological value. This partially collapsed tower has a partially circular shape in plan. Voids within the masonry body and early findings of the wood remnants in these holes reveal the existence of the bond beams. There were horizontally placed wooden bond beams within the tower walls at several levels in the original construction. The main purpose of these bond beams is to provide in-plane and out-of-plane stabilization of these masonry walls. The voids left after decayed wooden bond beams create weaknesses, such as stress concentration around the holes and a decrease in buckling resistance. A simplified finite element model of one of the partially collapsed towers is prepared and a parametric study is performed. Effects of the voids are examined and filling the voids with a mortar, modulus of elasticity of mortar close to the masonry wall, improved the response of the structure. As a minimum intervention approach to limit further degradation, before any archaeological excavation program starts on the site, mortar fill to the existing bond beam voids is proposed.

Construction industry is open to innovation and change. The evolution of information technologies led these technologies to be integrated also into building production processes, and it is aimed to carry out the building production processes in a faster, systematic and controlled manner. In this context, Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Virtual Reality (VR) technologies, which are information technologies used in building production processes, are widely encountered. Many conveniences are provided in building production processes in integrated projects carried out with BIM processes and VR tools. The study aims to identify the objectives, strengths and weaknesses of using BIM and VR integration in building production processes and to evaluate them in the context of potential threats and opportunities. A literature review and a company survey based on user experiences have been conducted in this study.

İnşaat sektörü yeniliğe ve değişikliklere açık bir sektördür. Yapı üretim süreçlerine entegre olabilecek birçok enformasyon teknolojisi geliştirilmiş, yapı üretim süreçlerinin daha hızlı, sistematik ve kontrollü olarak yürütülmesi amaçlanmıştır. Bu bağlamda yapı üretim süreçlerinde kullanılan enformasyon teknolojilerinden Yapı Bilgi Modelleme (BIM) ve Sanal Gerçeklik (VR) teknolojileri yaygın olarak karşımıza çıkmaktadır. BIM süreçleriyle ve VR araçlarıyla yürütülen entegre projelerde yapı üretim süreçlerinde pek çok kolaylık sağlanmaktadır. Çalışmada yapı üretim süreçlerinde BIM ve VR entegrasyonunun kullanımının amaçlarını, güçlü ve zayıf yanlarını tespit etmek ve potansiyel tehdit ve fırsatlar bağlamında bir değerlendirme yapmak amaçlanmıştır. Bu bağlamda literatür taraması ve kullanıcı deneyimlerinin baz alındığı firma araştırması yapılmıştır.

This study aims to present field research and evaluate the common failure types for most of the cultural heritage buildings in an ancient district of Antakya (Antioch) after the two consecutive devastating earthquakes occurred in Kahramanmaraş, Turkey on February 6, 2023. The first one occurred at 04:17 (01:17 UTC), a moment magnitude (Mw) 7.7 (AFAD, Disaster, and Emergency Management Presidency), an earthquake occurred in Pazarcık-Kahramanmaraş and it was followed by another earthquake at 13:24 (10:24 UTC), an Mw 7.6 earthquake at Elbistan-Kahramanmaraş. For the post-reconnaissance evaluation of the cultural heritage buildings in Antioch, a field trip was arranged to the site. Since the aftershocks were happening, the field trip was extremely dangerous, especially around damaged or heavily damaged structures. The use of laser scanners made it possible for safer documentation of these structures. The cultural heritage structures studied herein are in an ancient part of Antakya (ancient Antioch) called Kurtuluş Caddesi (Rue Jadid, yeni cadde). Damages on the registered heritage buildings in this study are classified as in different damage levels. One of the most common failure types observed is the out-of-plane movement of the walls. Exhaustion of the in-plane strength capacity of the walls is followed by an out-of-plane mechanism. Many other failure types are either due to the absence of engineering practices or false restoration practices. As a case study, some of these structures are examined by simplified limit analysis and the results are presented. Even though restoring these structures depends on many variables and various stakeholders, a simple guide for restoration is provided for the elimination of similar problems for future events.

Most of the traditional houses in western Anatolia are a type of hımış (traditional timber frame) structure. Deterioration of these traditional houses is mostly due to their abandonment. Abandonment causes the structure’s load-bearing system vulnerable to environmental effects and ultimately weakens the structure against seismic loads. A case study is performed on the Orhaneli houses. Building-scale suggestions are proposed towards the conservation of these houses based on the performed analysis and documentation. The results of simplified limit analysis of 20 houses utilized in this study are presented and the need for finite element modeling of these structures with sophisticated connection detailing is underlined. It is observed that the majority of examined houses are resilient for the seismic events of 50% probability of exceedance in 50 years, however, they need to be retrofitted for the seismic events of 10% probability of exceedance in 50 years.

Prestressed soil anchors are utilized as a part of a deep excavation support system of a construction site in Turkey. After the completion of the construction, temporary soil anchors used for this site were no longer needed and, therefore, idle. Another construction about 2 years later started near this site. For the deep excavation support system for the second site, the soil anchors of the first site were used as tendons. After the construction was completed at the second site, the tendons became idle too. In this case study, the selected procedure provided several advantages to the construction in the second lot in terms of time and the overall cost of the excavation support system. The implementation of this system requires as-built information on the temporary support system of the first site. Besides, the free stressing length of the anchor utilized for the wall at the first lot is supposed to be longer than the distance to the second wall that is planned to be built at the neighboring lot so that the stressing is possible. Soil anchor strands used for the first construction site are to be intact. This paper presents the application of previously installed soil anchors as post-tensioned tendons and also the approach for the tendon post-tensioning load.

A portion of Byzantine land walls from “Mevlanakapi” to “Belgradkapi”, part of Theodosian walls, is surveyed by laser scanners for recording the current condition and for identification of the damage levels towards the establishment of restoration approaches. Based on the failure mechanism of the structure and review of the earlier restorations, a restoration approach with minimum interventions to the historic structure is established. A parametric study is also performed to identify the seismic response of towers based on nonlinear static pushover analysis, and the simplified charts are presented for a simpler implementation of a diaphragm as a restoration strategy for towers.