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Do you wonder how these buildings made from concrete and cement get cracked out of nowhere? Building cracks can happen anywhere in the house; the walls, terrace, and ceilings. There are so many parts of a building that can crack. This article will explain what causes your building walls to open up and how you can fix that menace. 

A cracked wall is a wall with a long gap or split showing in the walls that were not originally the design of the wall. A hole punched deliberately into a building is not a crack. Good construction practice means civil engineers receive construction documents that contain all instructions and specified activities to follow. Unfortunately, some civil engineers often fail to read instructions to a building construction project out of complacency or ignorance. By carefully surveying and studying documents attached to property development, contractors find the exact operational mechanism to construct a strong building from start to finish.

Buildings of all ages are susceptible to cracks. The width of the opening on walls describes the degree of the crack. A crack size between 5-15mm is moderate damage, while a crack size up to 25mm is regarded as a severe wall defect. 

Wall Cracks! What Causes Them?
There are several reasons your walls will crack that may not always be the fault of a contractor. Cracked walls are uncomfortable but are rarely a cause for alarm. It is crucial to identify what caused a crack in a building to figure out how to repair it. Cracked walls often occur as a result of natural phenomena. Keep reading to know some of the potential reasons your walls are likely to face a crack.

Changes in Content in Moisture
Buildings absorb moisture in the soil when there are pores in the structure of building materials. The moisture absorption tends to cause an expansion to the building and shrinkage when the moisture dries up in the walls. This cycle of expansion and shrinkage leads to cracked walls over time.

Poor Construction Practice
Carelessness, complacency, greed, ignorance, or negligence often lead some engineers to use cheap materials to build. Some contractors entirely neglect to supervise the entire construction process effectively. No or partial supervision means contractors don’t get to check which subcontractor does a poor job working on the building. For instance, an incorrect ratio of water in a concrete mix may lead to a generally weak structure prone to cracks in the future.

Thermal Expansion
One of the most potent causes of building cracks is thermal expansion. Materials used for building expand when walls are exposed to ambient heat and retract when cooled. Thermal expansion affects the walls of buildings more than any other part of the house because the walls are exposed to the harsh nature of the sun. Over time, the walls begin to crack due to continued expansion and contractions.

Poor Maintenance
After a while, walls need to be maintained. Buildings naturally deteriorate overtime when it’s vacant for a long time. Consistent maintenance with painting and applying protective coating once in a while will keep walls healthy and protected against moisture and harsh weather conditions.

Other Factors
There are other reasons your walls will crack. These include structural instability, chemical reaction of materials, external impact on the building, bad tapping, structural damage, brutal house decorations, and many others.

What to do
The good news is that cracked walls are often not severe and can be fixed with basic DIY home practices. However, it is always recommended that you contact a professional building engineer to carefully survey the severity of your cracked walls and fix it.

When last did you think of the rise of fancy architectural designs in Ghana? Probably not until you saw a building that piqued your interest. Growth, they say, is inevitable, and so is development, as there is no growth without development. 

The construction sector in Ghana has seen tremendous growth from basic home designs to building ultra-modern, well some people will say, ‘smart homes.’ Construction, the umbrella word, simply defines designing, creating, and maintaining buildings, highways, and bridges. To envisage and conceptualize an actual structure into reality requires a professional, a civil engineer, who is skilled enough to make that happen. 

In 2020, the construction sector contributed over 12.8 billion Ghana cedis amounting to roughly 2.1 billion United States dollars to Ghana’s GDP. That is how much the construction sector is growing in Ghana. According to a report released by the Ghana Statistical Service, the construction sector in Ghana recorded over 18 percent year-on-year growth within the third quarter of 2018. This growth also means there is a high employment rate in the industry. For instance, the building construction sector alone employs over 400,000 people and an estimated number of roughly 2,500 civil engineers operating in the Ghanaian market. These players range from small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) to multinational construction engineering giants.

So what actually led to this growth? According to Page et al. (2020) in their publication; ‘Mining for Change: Natural Resources and Industry in Africa, “The discovery of oil in Ghana in commercial proportions in 2007 may be reasonably expected to have had significant consequences for the construction sector. Indeed, the production and export of oil has driven large-scale projects in the country’s construction sector, such as investments in real estate (to provide accommodation for migrant workers and expatriates), the port in Takoradi, and other infrastructure projects around the country”. The rapid economic boom, urbanization, and high demand for real estate development in Ghana, by no doubt, led to an equally increased demand for a transformational taste in residential and commercial building designs.

There are several types of beautiful architecturally designed houses in Ghana today, thanks to the ever-growing ingenuity of our civil engineers. We have come a long way from building old traditional homes made from mud bricks to five-star luxury apartments. Pay a visit to Ghana today and see several houses ranging from simple conventional houses(found chiefly in rural areas) to luxury dwellings. There is always provision for commercial buildings from simple grade to high-end construction. In Ghana, the general types of houses you will often find are apartment homes, detached and semi-detached homes, flats, bungalows, villas, condominiums, maisonette, and many more.

Thanks to technological advancement, and the high demand for real estate, civil engineers continue to redefine the types of construction they undertake to satisfy the growing sophisticated needs of clients and the environment. The layout of space to the material used for construction contributes to how home occupants get attached to their homes. This attachment affects their health, mood, and productivity. It has become imperative that civil engineers consider the importance of energy-saving homes as an added value to what their clients bargain for before they award contracts; after all, who doesn’t want to own a house that possibly combats global warming.

There is a growing number of people who keep venturing into the world of civil engineering due to the never-ending opportunities for growth in the construction sector. Universities worldwide offer degree courses for students who wish to become civil engineers. This is evident that the future of construction is layered with superior and higher cutting edge buildings the world can only imagine.