The objective of this research is to address a knowledge gap related to fire performance of midply shear walls. Testing has already been done to establish the structural performance of these assemblies. To ensure their safe implementation and their broad acceptance, this project will establish fire resistance ratings for midply shear walls. Fire tests will provide information for the development of design considerations for midply shear walls and confirm that they can achieve at least 1-hour fire-resistance ratings that are required for use in mid-rise buildings.
This research will support greater adoption of mid-rise residential and non-residential wood-frame construction and improve competition with similar buildings of noncombustible construction. This work will also support the development of the APA system report for midply walls, which will be a design guideline for using midply walls in North America.
Recent interests in adopting sustainable materials and developments in construction technology have created a trend of aiming for greater heights with timber buildings. With the increased height these buildings are subjected to higher level of lateral load demand. A common and efficient way to increase capacity is to use shearwalls, which can resist significant part of the load on the structures. Prefabricated mass timber panels such as those made of Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT) can be used to form the shearwalls. But due to relatively low stiffness value of timber it is often difficult to keep the maximum drifts within acceptable limit prescribed by building codes. It becomes necessary to either increase wall sizes to beyond available panel dimensions or use multiple or groups of walls spread over different locations over the floor plan. Both of the options are problematic from the economic and functional point of view. One possible alternative is to adopt a Hybrid system, using Steel Plate Shear Walls (SPSW) with timber moment frames. The SPSW has much higher stiffness and combined with timber frames it can reduce overall building drifts significantly. Frames with prefabricated timber members have considerable lateral load capacity. For structures located in seismic regions the system possesses excellent energy dissipation ability with combination of ductile SPSW and yielding elements within the frames. This paper investigates combination of SPSW with timber frames for seismic applications. Numerical model of the system has been developed to examine the interaction between the frames and shear walls under extreme lateral load conditions. Arrangements of different geometries of frames and shear walls are evaluated to determine their compatibility and efficiency in sharing lateral loads. Recommendations are presented for optimum solutions as well as practical limits of applications.
This project studied the effect of openings on the lateral performance of CLT shear walls
and the system behavior of the walls in a module. Three-layer Cross Laminated Timber
(CLT) was used for manufacturing the wall and module specimens. The laminar was
Spruce-Pine-Fir (SPF) #2&Better for both the major and minor layers. Each layer was 35
mm thick. The panel size was 2.44 m × 2.44 m.
Four configurations of walls were investigated: no opening, 25% opening, 37.5% opening,
and 50% opening. The opening was at the center of the wall and in the shape of a square.
A CLT module was made from two walls with 50% openings, with an overall thickness of
660 mm. The specimens were tested under monotonic loading and reverse-cyclic loading,
in accordance with ASTM E564-06 (2018) and ASTM E2126-19.
The wall without opening had an average peak load of 111.8 kN. It had little internal
deformation and the failure occurred at the connections. With a 25% opening, deformation
within the wall was observed but the failure remained at the connections. It had the same
peak load as the full wall. When the opening was increased to 37.5%, the peak load
decreased by 6% to 104.9 kN and the specimens failed in wood at the corners of the
opening. Further increasing the opening to 50%, the peak load dropped drastically to 63.4
kN, only 57% of the full wall.
The load-displacement relationship was approximately linear until the load reached 60%
of the peak or more. Compared to the full wall, the wall with 25% opening had 65% of the
stiffness. When the opening increased to 37.5% and 50%, the stiffness reduced to 50% and
24% of the full wall, respectively. The relationship between stiffness and opening ratio was
approximately linear. The loading protocol had effect on the peak load but not on the
stiffness. There was more degradation for larger openings under reverse-cyclic loading.
The performance of the module indicated the presence of system effect that improves the
ductility of the wall, which is important for the seismic performance of the proposed
midrise to tall wood buildings. The test data was compared to previous models found in
literature. Simplified analytical models were also developed to estimate the lateral stiffness
and strength of CLT wall with openings.
Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is revolutionizing the use of wood in the construction sector of North America as a solution for walls and diaphragms in mid-rise or even high-rise timber structures on account of its environmental advantages, high strength-to- weight ratio, fire-safety performance, and propensity for prefabrication. However, considering the hygroscopic nature of wood, moisture intrusion can affect material properties and, moreover, moisture increases the possibility of biological degradation, which can directly affect the durability of CLT structural members and their connections. The favorable seismic performance of connections in the CLT structural systems has been well researched in numerous studies. In addition, even though several research efforts have been conducted to understand the hygrothermal performance of CLT panels, knowledge of the CLT connections when subjected to moisture cycling is minimal. In this study, a CLT shear wall-to-diaphragm L-bracket connection is exposed to two high moisture exposure conditions - flood and simulated rain with increased humidity as well as different exposure durations to investigate the connection performance under the effects of moisture intrusion. Currently, there are four major species that are used for CLT, namely, Douglas-fir, Southern yellow pine, Norway spruce, and Spruce Pine Fir. All four species were incorporated into the study. A total of 264 cyclic tests were performed on wall-to-diaphragm L-bracket connection specimens to evaluate the connection performance in terms of strength, stiffness, and energy dissipation along with the development of two force-displacement engineering models. Results from both exposure studies suggest no significant degradation in connection performance after a moisture cycle of wetting and drying apart from a significant decrease in energy dissipation in flood exposure. However, the effects of multiple moisture cycling merit further study.
Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is a wood panel product that can be arranged in different ways. The advantage of utilizing CLT is the ability to use lamination even with low density materials or those that have defects, like knots. This study evaluated the bonding and bending performances of CLT utilizing domestic species in a shear wall or floor via a face bonding test of layers and a three-point bending test. The tests were carried out with three-layered CLT made up of Japanese larch and/or Korean red pine in various configurations. The layer arrangement for lamination was divided according to the species and grade of the wood. The out-of-plane and in-plane bending tests were conducted on the CLT according to the applicable direction in a wooden structure. The results of the bonding test showed that the block shear strength and delamination of all types of CLT met the BS EN 16351 (2015) standard requirements. The results of the bending test based on two wood species showed that the bending strength of the larch CLT was higher than that of the pine CLT in single species combinations. For mixed species combinations, the bending properties of CLT using larch as the major layer was higher than those using pine as the major layer. This demonstrated that the major layer had more influence on the bending properties of CLT and that Korean red pine was more suited for the minor layer of CLT.
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