About the PHRC Laboratory Facilities

State of the Art Research at the PHRC

Among other activities, PHRC provides Research and Development services to the home building industry in order to improve the quality and affordability of housing and to promote sustainability and energy efficiency in residential construction.  PHRC conducts various types of applied research to support housing-related building product manufacturers in their efforts to improve product performance to today’s standards.  Special emphasis is given to technical/engineering evaluations and analysis, computer modeling, and laboratory testing studies.  By providing laboratory testing services and engineering performance evaluation studies to product manufacturers, PHRC fosters the development and commercialization of innovative technologies and supports code-conformance efforts.  PHRC also provides Research and Development services to builders and remodelers in their efforts towards high performance building systems.

The Penn State Architectural Engineering and Civil & Environmental Engineering Departments, within which PHRC operations are based, feature a wide range of building research laboratories and facilities where research projects aimed at improving the quality of residential construction are conducted.  This brochure provides a brief overview of the capabilities of the building research labs housed in these two departments.

Flexible Laboratory Facilities

PHRC and affiliated labs have extensive facilities for the purpose of state-of-the art building science research investigations and testing.   These labs are unique in that all of their facilities allow flexible reconfiguration to support research and testing protocols beyond their normal function.  We have the ability to design custom testing set ups and protocols to evaluate alternative construction mockups. Testing facilities and equipment in the labs support structural, material property, thermal, weatherability, and indoor air quality investigations. 

These facilities are fully computer controlled in order to accommodate a wide variety of tests and configurations.

Qualified Personnel

Lab personnel have participated in the process of converting custom methods used or developed in the labs to test standards.  PHRC can integrate its activities with other testing labs to develop the most cost-effective solutions for client’s research and testing needs.

Technical expertise has been developed in these labs to accommodate a wide range of research and standards-based testing relevant to the building industry following standard methods and acceptance criteria established by AAMA, ANSI, APA, ASHRAE, ASTM, GSA, ICC-ES, ISO, NFRC, and others. 

Building Product Systems Testing

These labs have experience evaluating conformance to standard specifications and testing building product individual components, built-up constructions, systems and technologies.  Building products and systems comprised of composite materials, concrete, custom coatings and finishes, glass, insulating materials, masonry and mortars, metal, plastics, sealants, adhesives, stone, and wood can be tested in these facilities. 

In addition to the custom facilities described on this page, component testing facilities and equipment  are available to evaluate material properties of building components and built-up constructions as appropriate such as tensile, compressive, flexural and shear strength, elongation, moduli, hardness, shrinkage, expansion, abrasion resistance, adhesion, cohesion, absorption, adsorption, cleanability, specific gravity, density, composition, etc.  

Innovation to Support Industry

PHRC can help you to develop appropriate field and laboratory assessments and investigations to assess your building products and systems.  We can work with you to develop strategies for gaining code compliance and approvals of your unique and proprietary building products and systems.  Moreover, we will follow quality assurance and quality control procedures necessary to gain acceptance of test reports that we prepare by accrediting agencies.  

Our dissemination efforts can also be used to move the technologies we help to develop in the lab to mainstream acceptance through our participation in the process of developing design and construction guidance documents, code change proposals, acceptance criteria, and test standards and specifications.

For information on how PHRC can meet your laboratory needs please contact Dr. Ali Memari, Director of PHRC or Paul Kremer, Research Associate and Manager of the laboratories of the PHRC and the Department of Architectural Engineering.