Stiffness and Shear Stress Distribution of Glulam Beams in Elastic-Plastic Stage:Theory,Experiments and Numerical Modelling

Traditional methods focus on the ultimate bending moment of glulam beams and the fracture failure of materials with defects,which usually depends on empirical parameters.There is no systematic theoretical method to predict the stiffness and shear distribution of glulam beams in elastic-plastic stage,and consequently,the failure of such glulam beams cannot be predicted effectively.To address these issues,an analytical method considering material nonlinearity was proposed for glulam beams,and the calculating equations of deflection and shear stress distribution for different failure modes were established.The proposed method was verified by experiments and numerical models under the corresponding conditions.Results showed that the theoretical calculations were in good agreement with experimental and numerical results,indicating that the equations proposed in this paper were reliable and accurate for such glulam beams with wood material in the elastic-plastic stage ignoring the influence of mechanic properties in radial and tangential directions of wood.Furthermore,the experimental results reported by the previous studies indicated that the method was applicable and could be used as a theoretical reference for predicting the failure of glulam beams.

Investigation of the Effect of the Force Arm on the Bending Capability of Prestressed Glulam Beam

Prestress enables the Glulam beam could make full use of the compression strength,and then increase the span,but it still could not reduce all drawbacks,such as cross-section weakening and small force arm.To avoid slotting and ensure suitable tension and compression couple,one kind of novel anchor has been proposed,which could meet the bearing capacity requirement.And then the bending test of prestressed Glulam beams with a geometric scale ratio of 1:2 was simulated,to investigate the effect of the force arm on bending capacities,failure modes,and deformation performance.Results show that increasing the force arm could improve the ultimate bending per-formance of the beam significantly,and the anchor arm length has a certain effect on the performance,but it is not obvious.Finally,based on Finite element method analysis,the practice design suggestions have been offered.

Long-Term Loading Test of Reinforced Glulam Beam

Due to creep characteristics of wood,long-term loading can cause a significant stress loss of steel bars in rein-forced glulam beams and high long-term deflection of the beam midspan.In this study,15 glulam beams were subjected to a 90-day long-term loading test,and the effects of long-term loading value,reinforcement ratio and prestress level on the stress of steel bars,midspan long-term deflection,and other parameters were compared and analyzed.The main conclusions drawn from this study were that the long-term deflection of the reinforced glulam beams accounted for 22.5%,20.6%,and 18.2%of the total deflection respectively when the loading value was 20%,30%,and 40%of the estimated ultimate load under the long-term loading.The higher the loading level was,the smaller the proportion of the long-term deflection in the total deflection was.Compared with ordinary glulam beams,the long-term deflection of the reinforced glulam beam was even smaller.Under the condition of the constant loading level,the total stress value of the steel bars decreased by 17.5%,13.6%,and 9.1%,and the proportion of the long-term deflection of the beam midspan in the total deflection was 26.9%,24.2%,and 20.6%respectively when the reinforcement ratio was 2.05%,2.68%,and 3.39%.With the increase of the reinfor-cement ratio,the stress loss of the steel bars decreased,and the proportion of the long-term deflection decreased as well.When other conditions remained constant and the prestress level of the steel bars was 0 MPa,30 MPa,and 60 MPa,the total stress value of the steel bars decreased by 9.1%,9.4%,and 10.2%,respectively,and the propor-tion of the long-term deflection in the total deflection was 20.6%,26.1%,and 64.9%,respectively.With the increase of the prestress value,the stress loss of the steel bars increased,and the proportion of the long-term deflection increased as well.

Long-Term Bending Behaviour of Prestressed Glulam Bamboo-Wood Beam Based on Creep Effect

Creep is an important characteristic of bamboo and wood materials under long-term loading.This paper aims to study the long-term bending beha-viour of prestressed glulam bamboo-wood beam(GBWB).For this,14 pre-stressed GBWBs were selected and subjected to a long-term loading test for 60 days.Then,a comparative analysis was performed for the effects of pre-tension values,the number of pre-stressed wires,and long-term load on the stress variation of the steel wire and the long-term deflection of the beam midspan.The test results showed that with the number of prestressed wires increasing,the total stress of the steel wire in the beam midspan and the ratio of the long-term deflec-tion to the total deflection decreases decreased,but when the number of steel wires exceeded 4,the total stress and long-term deflection was less infuenced;with the pre-tension value increasing,the ratio of the total stress of the steel wire in the beam midspan and the ratio of the long-temm deflection to the total deflec-tion also decreased,but when the prestress force was greater than 3.975 kN,the:total stress and long-term deflection were less affected;with the other parameters unchanged,when the value of the long-term load increased,the total stress of the steel wire decreased,and the long-temm deflection of the beam midspan increased,which shall be more significant with the long-term load greater than 30%of the standard ultimate bearing capacity.After the test,the experimental data were fitted,and the creep coefficient was given.Finally,the long-term stiffness calcula-tion fommula of the pre-stressed GBWB based on creep effect was proposed.The research findings have certain theoretical significance and engineering value.

Fire resistance performance of glulam beam

A glulam beam with the size of 4700 mm×300 mm×480 mm(L×W×H) was tested in the furnace to investigate the fire resistance performance of glulam beam according to the temperature curve of ISO834. Three surfaces, the bottom and the two flanks, of the glulam beam were exposed to fire in the test. Simply supported bearings were used to support the beam on which the load of 0.76 kN/m was uniformly set. The experimental results show that: 1) Sectional dimension of glulam beam was greatly diminished due to the serious decomposition and carbonization of the timber. 2) The largest vertical deformation is relatively small and it has not exceeded 3.95 mm until the end of experiment. The maximum temperature on the top surface of the glulam beam attains 180 ℃ at 3437 s, which indicates that the beam have failed according to the European standard of fire resistance tests. 3) The right end of the beam with 16 connecting holes(the connecting holes were used for the connection between bolt and column) and the slit in the beam both burnt intensely and carbonized seriously because the fire could reach the holes and slit of beam facilitating the burning.