Post-and-lintel is an ancient construction technique using two vertical mullions and a horizontal lintel. It was used in Stonehenge and ancient Greek and Roman temples. Arches and trusses were later developed to increase load capacity. Laminated timber is a modern improvement. Stone has good compressive strength but is rarely used in modern construction due to transportation and construction difficulties.
Post and lintel is a construction technique that features two vertical members, called mullions, with a beam, called a lintel, joining them at the top. Post-and-lintel construction is one of the oldest known techniques. Post-and-lintel construction is used extensively in contemporary buildings, from single-family homes to multi-story structures.
This construction technique was used at Stonehenge, which is estimated to have been built in 2,800 BC. The ancient Greeks and Romans built post and lintel temples whose ruins many people still travel to see. Many of the surviving structures were made of stone, but stone doesn’t have the tensile strength to span long distances. The Romans overcame this problem by using arches, which support much more weight than a flat lintel. Arched stone bridges and aqueducts built by the Romans still stand across Europe, some 2,000 years after they were built.
The weak part of the post and lintel construction, the lintel or transom, has been the subject of a number of innovations over time. Arches, cross arches and vaults were the first improvements. The trusses are another development which has increased the carrying capacity of the lintel portion. A truss is basically a series of triangles, wood or steel, sandwiched between two straight beams. Trusses are used extensively in both the design and construction of roofs and bridges because they support much more weight than simple straight lintels and are quicker and easier to construct than arches.
An improvement on the lintel from the 20th century is laminated timber, short for “glued laminated timber”. The lamination process is designed to increase the load capacity of the laminated wood. They can be made as traditional straight or curved lintels both for aesthetics and to further increase their load capacity. Lamellars are sometimes used where they will be visible as they are more attractive than steel.
Compressive strength limits the bearing capacity of a post, just as tensile strength limits the bearing capacity of a lintel. Stone posts have very good compressive strength and can support a large mass. However, compared to wood or steel, stone piles are difficult and expensive to transport and cumbersome in the construction process. Consequently, even though stone has considerably greater compressive strength than wood, it is rarely used as a pile element in modern construction.
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