As the interest in timber buildings is increasing, more attention is pointed towards highrise timber buildings. Partly because it is one of the main areas pushing the development within the field of timber structures. As the current tallest timber building, Mjöstornet in Brumunddal is approximately 10 times shorter than the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa, the intuition says that there is room for major improvements regarding tall timber structures. The aim of this thesis is therefore to investigate the possibilities to build a 200 m tall timber tower while still fulfilling the requirements for strength, stability and dynamics. In order to anchor the project in reality, the assumed building location is Gothenburg with the ground conditions of solid rock.
Early in the study it was concluded that in order to push the height limits, the building design had to be improved compared to the existing timber buildings. The main geometries of interest turned out to be the circular shape thanks to its aerodynamical benefits. This base shape was applied in various ways, generating five different concepts ready for evaluation.
Each of the five concepts were modelled and preliminary sized using Grasshopper and Karamba 3D, whereafter they were evaluated based on their dynamic performance, global stiffness, and a few other evaluation criteria. The evaluation was primary made with structural performance in mind and secondary with regard to comfort, quality and economical aspects.
The results show that one of the concepts have great potential of reaching 200 m despite the uncertainties regarding joint stiffness and structural damping. Also, a few of the other concepts might be able to reach 200 m if subject to some structural and dynamical improvements.
New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering Conference
Research Status
Complete
Notes
April 13-15, 2012, Christchurch, New Zealand
Summary
The Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology Arts and Media building was completed in 2011 and consists of three seismically separate complexes. This research focussed on the Arts building as it showcases the use of coupled post-tensioned timber shear walls. These are part of the innovative Expan system. Full-scale, in-situ dynamic testing of the novel building was combined with finite element modelling and updating to obtain an understanding of the structural dynamic performance within the linear range. Ambient testing was performed at three stages during construction and was combined with forced vibration testing for the final stage. This forms part of a larger instrumentation program developed to investigate the wind and seismic response and long term deformations of the building. A finite element model of the building was formulated and updated using experimental modal characteristics. It was shown that the addition of non-structural elements, such as cladding and the staircase, increased the natural frequency of the first mode and the second mode by 19% and 24%, respectively. The addition of the concrete floor topping as a structural diaphragm significantly increased the natural frequency of the first mode but not the second mode, with an increase of 123% and 18%, respectively. The elastic damping of the NMIT building at low-level vibrations was identified as being between 1.6% and 2.4%
The ambient movement of three modern multi-storey timber buildings has been measured and used to determine modal properties. This information, obtained by a simple, unobtrusive series of tests, can give insights into the structural performance of these forms of building, as well as providing information for the design of future, taller timber buildings for dynamic loads. For two of the buildings, the natural frequency has been related to the lateral stiffness of the structure, and compared with that given by a simple calculation. In future tall timber buildings, a new design criterion is expected to become important: deflection and vibration serviceability under wind load. For multi-storey timber buildings there is currently no empirical basis to estimate damping for calculation of wind-induced vibration, and there is little information for stiffness under wind load. This study therefore presents a method to address those gaps in knowledge.
Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Construction Materials
Summary
Cross-laminated timber has, in the last 6 years, been used for the first time to form shear walls and cores in multi-storey buildings of seven storeys or more. Such buildings can have low mass in comparison to conventional structural forms. This low mass means that, as cross-laminated timber is used for taller buildings still, their dynamic movement under wind load is likely to be a key design parameter. An understanding of dynamic lateral stiffness and damping, which has so far been insufficiently researched, will be vital to the effective design for wind-induced vibration. In this study, an ambient vibration method is used to identify the dynamic properties of a seven-storey cross-laminated timber building in situ. The random decrement method is used, along with the Ibrahim time domain method, to extract the modal properties of the structure from the acceleration measured under ambient conditions. The results show that this output-only modal analysis method can be used to extract modal information from such a building, and that information is compared with a simple structural model. Measurements on two occasions during construction show the effect of non-structural elements on the modal properties of the structure.
Project contact is Chris Pantelides at the University of Utah
Summary
A mass timber buckling-restrained braced frame is proposed to enhance the seismic resilience of mass timber buildings. Constructed using wood generated from the national forest system, the mass timber buckling-restrained brace will be integrated with a mass timber frame for structural energy dissipation under seismic or wind loads. The team will improve and optimize the design of structural components based on feedback from a real-time health monitoring system. Outcomes include guidelines for a lateral force resisting system of mass timber buildings in high seismic or wind regions.
During the last years the interest in multi-storey timber buildings has increased and several medium-to-high-rise buildings with light-weight timber structure have been designed and built. Examples of such are the 8-storey building Limnologen in Växjö, Sweden, the 9- storey Stadthaus in London, UK and being constructed at the moment, the 14-storey building Treet in Bergen, Norway. These are all light-weight and flexible structures which raise questions regarding the wind induced vibrations. For the building in Norway, the calculated vibration properties of the top floor are on the limit of being acceptable according to the ISO 101371 vibration criteria for human comfort. This paper will give a review of building systems for medium-to-high-rise timber buildings. Measured vibration properties for some medium-to-high-rise timber buildings will also be presented. These data have been used for calculating the peak acceleration values for two example buildings for comparison with the ISO standards. An analysis of the acceleration levels for a building with double the height has also been performed showing that designing for wind induced vibrations in higher timber buildings is going to be very important and that more research into this area is needed.
The paper presents the design and modelling of Cathedral Hill 2, a 15-storey timber building, planned for construction in Canada. The building is a 59-metre tall office-use construction with an all-timber structure where the lateral-load-resisting system consists of segmented Pres-Lam walls. The paper firstly presents the design philosophy, and the motivations for the use of the Pres-Lam system, which was mainly driven by serviceability limit-state wind loading. The final part of the paper shows the verification of the building’s dynamic behaviour using non-linear time-history analysis, showing that, although the lateral-load design is governed by serviceability limit-state wind deflections, earthquake demand must not be overlooked due to higher-mode amplifications.
Over the past several decades, the market for ready-to-assemble (RTA) products has grown significantly. RTA kitchen cabinets and furniture are commonplace because they can be shipped flat and assembled on site, which has greatly reduced shipping costs associated with an otherwise voluminous product. Packaged with necessary hardware and instructions, these RTA products are typically easy to assemble and fool proof. The development of a standardized safe room using CLT that is ready to assemble, easy to ship, and quick to fabricate on site would not only increase the level of safety for our population but also increase the market opportunity for these engineered wood products. This research is an extension of research by the USDA Forest Service, Forest Products Laboratory, to develop a do-it-yourself safe room constructed from wood that can be incorporated into existing housing and that utilizes commodity wood products.
The objective of this project is to develop a RTA tornado safe room and shelter from CLT for use in existing and new residential and commercial construction.
The development and use of tornado shelters have helped reduce loss of human life associated with extreme weather events. Currently, the majority of shelters are built from either steel or concrete. The development of the crosslaminated timber (CLT) industry in the United States has provided an ideal wood product to resist the debris impact...
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