Cross‐laminated Timber Plates Subjected to Concentrated Loading

Abstract

ABSTRACT Since wood products for structural elements, especially cross‐laminated timber (CLT), have gained importance in the building sector, the need for appropriate and reliable design codes for such wood products has become essential. For the improvement and development of design concepts, a profound knowledge about the mechanical behaviour of these products is necessary. For this reason, this work focuses on global failure mechanisms and the corresponding evolution of different crack modes in CLT plates, depending on geometric and/or material related properties. Therefore, plate‐bending experiments on three‐ and five‐layered CLT plates were carried out. In addition to standard evaluation methods, each specimen was cut into small cubes to identify the failure modes inside the plates. Regions with dominant shear failure, tensile failure, delamination and mixed failure modes could be captured and connected to geometry and loading situation. Based on this evaluation, well‐known but not yet in detail described effects, such as the ductile structural behaviour of CLT plates, can be explained. Moreover, the evolution of rolling shear failure modes as well as from which point the progressive failure highly affects the plate stiffness is investigated and analysed in detail.