Rolling Shear Properties of Cross-Laminated Timber Made from Australian Plantation Eucalyptus nitens under Planar Shear Test

Abstract

With the increasing availability of fast-growing Eucalyptus plantation logs in Australia in recent years, the timber manufacturing sector has become interested in discovering the opportunities of producing value-added timber products from this resource. Cross-laminated timber (CLT) could be a potential sustainable product recovered from this resource and supply material for commercial buildings. Shear of the inner cross-laminates, known as rolling shear, is one of the governing factors in serviceability and limit state design for this product under out-of-plane loading. This study evaluated the rolling shear (RS) properties of CLT with heterogonous layup configurations using different structural grade Eucalyptus nitens (E. nitens) timber under the planar shear test. Based on the results, Gr and τr values were shown to be significantly correlated with the density of the CLT panel. There was also a positive correlation between the RS modulus and MOR of the CLT panel. The specimens with high MOE in the top and bottom layers indicated the highest τr and Fmax values. This indicated that using high-grade boards in the top and bottom lamellae plays an important role in increasing the RS strength, whereas using them in the cross-layer has a positive contribution in increasing shear modulus. The maximum observed RS strength and modulus ranged from 2.8–3.4 MPa and 54.3–67.9 MPa, respectively, exceeding the RS characteristic values of the resource. The results obtained in this study were comparable to those recommended in European standards for softwood CLT, demonstrating the potential use for eucalypt timber boards in CLT production. This paper provides an important insight into supporting the potential engineering applications of CLT panel products fabricated with eucalypt plantation.

Study of Brazilian native wood 'Caryocar villosum' rolling shear properties to produce CLT panels.

“…Currently, several studies are being conducted to analyze the feasibility of using hardwoods in the production of CLT panels. These studies aim to evaluate the applicability of foreign species in homogeneous (Aicher et al 2016a;Ehrhart and Brandner 2018;Espinoza and Buehlmann 2018;Corpataux et al 2020;Ettelaei et al 2021;Ettelaei et al 2022;Nero et al 2022;Das et al 2023;Gutierrez et al 2023;Wang et al 2018) and hybrid panels (Aicher et al 2016b;Ma et al 2021;Hematabadi et al 2021;Srivaro et al 2022). The research regarding the application and mechanical properties of Brazilian native woods is still scarce, despite recent studies related to the topic (Silva et al 2023).Brazil has a large availability of these species, which could be an excellent alternative for this type of product.…”

Investigating Vibration Characteristics of Cross-Laminated Timber Panels Made from Fast-Grown Plantation Eucalyptus nitens under Different Support Conditions

“…Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is one option for utilising fibre-managed E. nitens feedstocks because the orthogonal layup can potentially offer more uniform physical and mechanical properties and reduce the effect of individual SPFs [5]. Pangh et al [6] conducted pioneering research to determine the bending properties of CLT derived from Eucalyptus plantations.…”

“…Their findings, including the modulus of elasticity (MOE) and modulus of rupture (MOR), suggested the potential utilisation of Eucalyptus plantations in CLT applications. Subsequently, Ettelaei et al [5] investigated rolling shear properties on heterogeneous E. nitens CLT samples under the Planar Shear Test. The results demonstrated that the performance of heterogeneous E. nitens CLT was satisfactory.…”

Investigating Factors Influencing Rolling Shear Performance of Australian CLT Feedstock

“…It is worth noting that most of the aforementioned research focused on the RS properties of CLT panels produced from European and North American timber species. Some recent studies reported RS properties of CLT panels produced from Australian radiata pine and New Zealand Douglas fir [18,19,32] and Australian Plantation Eucalyptus nitens [33]. However, no previous study has investigated the RS properties of CLT feedstock boards from commercially available Australian softwoods such as southern, hoop and radiata pine and examine the impact of various factors on RS properties.…”