The present invention relates to a panel for mounting in a building structure and a method of manufacturing such panel.

Temporary building structures or building structures that are simple and fast to erect by using suitable panels are well known from e.g. WO 2013/064150. In WO 2013/064150 a shelter construction is disclosed which comprises premade shells, i.e. preformed panels of e.g. polyurethane or polystyrene concrete for providing insulation. This is advantageous over the shelter constructions disclosed in GB 1 ,178,261 where the shells are made of glass fibre. In US 8,615,934 another example of a panelised portable shelter is known.

Such shelters are building structures of a portable kind are used in addition or instead of tents to provide immediate shelter for refugees, victims of a natural disaster or the like where people are made home-less and are therefore in need for accommodation. A requirement for such shelters is therefore that it is easy to transport to a sometimes remote geographical area in which it is needed and that it is easy to erect. Tents have been widely used as a tent fulfils these criteria, but a drawback for tents is that there is no thermal insulation. A further drawback is the relatively short life time of tents.

The building structure could also be a low cost or semi-permanent building, i.e. in regions with poverty or in situations where the building is needed for a limited number of years, e.g. for housing children or as a hunting lodge.

For a building structure, such as a shelter of the above-identified kind, it is desirable to obtain a building panel with good insulation properties besides the above-mentioned properties. The panels should also allow for construction that facilitates a quick, simple and easy construction of such a shelter. It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a panel.

Accordingly, this object is achieved by a panel for mounting in a building structure, said panel being a generally rectangular sandwich panel having a set of side edge regions and a set of end edge regions, the panel comprising a core material layer of low density mineral wool, exterior layers of high density on each side of the core material layer, wherein the core material extends beyond the exterior layers at at least one of the edge regions, preferably the side edge regions, thereby providing a compressible seal between adjacent panels when mounted in the building structure. This seal will generally provide adequate weatherproofing so separate sealing means or tarpaulin may be dispensed with.

The core material may extend beyond the exterior layers at both side edge regions, however it is preferred the core material extends beyond the exterior layers at one side edge only. The advantage is primarily that manufacture is easier with one side edge being flush for both core material and exterior layers.

A panel of such kind is found advantageous since the building structure constructed by such panels is simple to erect and the amount of fittings for the building structure to be mounted can be reduced. Particularly, it is found advantageous to use the mineral wool fibre material, since mineral wool fibre material can be made water repellent using limited amounts of added oil. So by utilising this property and by "oversizing" the core material at the edges, a compressible seal, which is water tight, is thereby achieved. The extension of approx. 5 mm is found adequate in order to achieve such seal.

Moreover, the mineral wool fibre boards are known to have good thermal and acoustic insulation characteristics as well as being fireproof and thereby provide the building structure with fire-preventing properties. The exterior layers may be made of any material providing strength and robustness to the panel. Suitable materials may include metal or fiber cement boards, and in some cases even wood fibre boards could be a relevant solution do to availability or price even though it is preferred that the materials are inorganic. However according to an embodiment at least one of the exterior layers is made of high density mineral wool. Mineral wool has favourable properties in relation to thermal insulation properties, and the risk delamination of the panel is minimized by using same materials for the core and the exterior layers as any difference in thermal expansion is limited.

In the preferred embodiments of the invention, the low density mineral wool fibre has a density between 30-100 kg/m ³ . Further, the high density exterior layers are preferably provided with a density between 400-500 kg/m ³ . By providing the exterior layers of the panel in such high density the panel will be provided with a hard outer shell, which is water repellent and resistant to absorbing moisture, and provides a good strength of the resultant sandwich panel. Likewise, the softer core material in the low-density range of 30-100 kg/m ³ ensures a light product with good insulation characteristics and which is easily compressible for the provision of sealing between two panels.

The core may be provided as a unitary mineral wool element, which may be provided as a web in roll form, allowing easy shipment and manufacture of the panels. Often mineral wool webs have an uneven surface structure, e.g. as a result of curing in a curing oven between belts having an open structure leaving a pattern on the cured mineral wool web surface. Such an uneven surface structure can provide difficulties in manufacture of sandwich panels, and in this case the surface is often machined to achieve an even surface.

In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the core is made of a plurality of mineral wool fibre lamella. Hereby, flexibility in the size and dimensional shape of the panels is achieved, just as a structural stiffness in the panel may be achieved. In an embodiment of the invention, said lamella are provided with different densities. Moreover, the fibre orientation of the core material is preferably perpendicular to the external surfaces of the panel so that the compression resistance in the orthogonal direction is high and the compressibility of the edge regions i.e. in a direction generally parallel to the exterior panel surfaces is ensured. Preferably, the lamellae making up the end edge sections are provided with in a density within the range of 60-500 kg/m ³ . This ensures a form stability for the panel edge geometry so that the panels may be provided with an edge geometry adapted for assembly with other building components, such as a sub-frame, a floor or the like. Connection of neighbouring panels can be achieved in a number of ways, such as by through-going tension rods or wires through the panels. Such tension rods could simply be forced through the mineral wool core layer, but it may be difficult in practice. In the preferred embodiment, one or more mounting tubes are provided substantially perpendicular to the side edge regions of the panels for guiding such tension rods or wires, preferably between two neighbouring lamellae in the core material layer. Hereby, the panels according to the invention are well adapted for being mounted together using the assembly method described in WO 2013/064150.

To dispense of the requirement of a separate sealing arrangement between the panels, according to another aspect of the invention there is provided a method of mounting a plurality of panels according to the above described aspect of the invention in a building structure, whereby a first panel is provided adjacent a second panel such that the two panels have abutting side edge regions, and then the first and second panels are then mounted to each other thereby compressing the abutting side edge regions for providing a seal being the two panels.

By the invention it is realised that the panel according to the invention may be flat or the panel may be provided with a predefined curvature. In a further aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of

manufacturing a panel according to any one of the preceding claims, said method comprising the steps of providing a first exterior board of high-density mineral wool fibre on a panel support member having a predefined shape, providing a core material layer of low-density mineral wool fibre, said core layer consisting of plurality of mineral wool fibre lamellae, and then providing a second exterior board of high-density mineral wool fibre on said core material layer, whereby the core material layer is provided such that extends beyond the exterior layers at at least one of the sets of edge regions, preferably the side edge regions, thereby providing a compressible seal between adjacent panels when mounted in the building structure.

In accordance with this method, the predefined shape of the panel support member may be planar such that the resulting panel is flat or the predefined shape of the panel support member may be provided with a curvature such that the resulting panel is provided with a predefined curvature.

The invention is described in further details with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which

Fig. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional view of a sandwich panel according to the

invention; Fig. 2 is a schematic drawing of two panels of fig. 1 assembled together;

Fig. 3 is a detailed view of the side edge region of a panel according to a preferred embodiment of the invention;

Fig. 4 is a side view of a panel according to a preferred embodiment of the

invention; and

Fig. 5 is a side view of a panel in the panel support member during manufacture.

With reference to fig. 1 , a panel according to the invention comprises a top and bottom exterior skin layers 1 , 3 sandwiching a core material 2.

The panels are made as a sandwich of skin layers 1 , 3 of high-density mineral wool, such as 400-500 kg/m ³ , and a core 2 of low-density mineral wool, such as 30-100 kg/m ³ . The core material 2 extends a little (approx. 5 mm) beyond the skin layers 1 , 3 at the side edge and this extension 21 act as a compressible seal between adjacent panels, since the mineral wool is water-repellent by minor amounts of added oil as is common. In fig. 2 two adjacent panels are shown mounted together and the adjacent top layers 1 , 1 ' and two bottom exterior layers 3, 3' abutting each other and then the extensions 21 , 21 ' are compressed. In fig. 3, the side edge region of a panel is shown. The skin layers 1 , 3 are provided as high-density mineral wool fibre boards glued onto each side of a low-density mineral wool core material 2 including the extension 21 protruding beyond the side edges of the skin layers 1 , 3. The fibre orientation of the core material 2 is oriented generally perpendicular to the top and bottom surfaces of the panel.

In a specific embodiment of a panel for a specific shelter design, the dimensions of the panels are: 600 mm wide, 45 mm thick (the two exterior skin layers of 5 mm, and core 35 mm). At present it is considered that the skin layers should be minimum 3 mm and max. 15 mm, and for the core material 20 mm is considered a minimum value. As shown in fig. 4, the core material is preferably made of mineral wool lamellae 2a-2f, which are turned 90° and glued together to form the core material 2. Hereby, the fibre direction is more or less at right angles to the skin layers 1 , 3. This is beneficial for gluing the skin layers 1 , 3 to the core material and for compression strength of the panels. At the foot of the panels a high density element 22 may be provided with a cut-out for engagement with a rail of the building structure foundation. Similarly at the apex of the building structure a high density element may be provided with a cut-out for receiving assembly means such as a mounting tube for alignment of the panels. Further each panel is provided with a plurality of mounting tubes 4 between elements 2a-2f of the core 2 providing a channel for insertion of threaded rods (not shown) or the like of the mounting system for the building structure. When all panels in the building structure are positioned the panels are compressed the soft core material 2 extending between adjacent panels will be compressed and form a weatherproof seal between adjacent panels, such as schematically shown in fig. 2.

As shown in fig. 5, the panel according to the invention is produced in a form 5 having a support surface 6. The first exterior skin layer 3 is placed on the support surface 6 in the form 5. The lamellae 2a-2f are then glued onto the inner surface of the exterior skin layer 3. Suitable mounting tubes 4 are provided as well and the ends 22 are also placed and adhesively bonded to the exterior skin layer 3. As an alternative the embodiment shown in fig. 4 and 5 the ends 22 may be covered on both sides by the exterior skin layer 3. Hereby the need for machining of the ends 22 is limited and anchoring of the ends 22 to the exterior layers optimized. Finally, the second exterior skin layer 1 is provided and glued onto the lamellae 2a-2f to finish the manufacture of the panel. A second moulding part (not shown) may be provided to hold the mineral wool fibre elements 1 , 2, 3 in place while the adhesive is being cured.

Above an embodiment of the invention is described. However, it is by the invention realised that other variants and embodiments may be provided without departing from the scope of the invention as defined in the accompanying claims.