The Use of Decay Model to Predict Service Life of Indonesian Historic Timber Buildings

Indonesia, one of the tropical countries in the world, is rich with cultural heritage. Almost every tribe in Indonesia has its own traditional timber house. Besides the traditional houses, the most common type of historic timber buildings in Indonesia is Sultanate’s Palace or perhaps Old Mosque. These buildings usually aged hundred of years and required to be kept lasting as national identity. It is quite essential to know their remaining service life as one of consideration in the conservation action plan. The main problem of using wood as a construction material is its durability. This durability aspect is closely related to degradation mechanisms. Timber degradation can be classified as mechanical, physical, chemical and biological degradation. The combination of biological degradation and a mechanical load is the essential parameter for service life modeling so far. The prediction of service life is conducted by using Decay Model from Australian CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) Sustainable Ecosystems for decay above ground mechanism. The model takes into account various aspects of the wood parameter, climate parameter, paint parameter, thickness parameter, width parameter, connection parameter, and geometry parameter. The opportunity to simulate the service life based on the Indonesian circumstances has been demonstrated in this paper. Keywords— historic timber building, service life, decay model, Indonesian environment