Bending Creep of Glulam and Bolted Glulam under Changing Relative Humidity
Jun‐Chul Park, Yo-Jin Song, Soon-Il Hong
Abstract
This study was carried out in order to evaluate the bending creep deflection of glulams and bolted glulams beam-to-beam connection with steel-gusset plates and bolts under changing relative humidity. The two types of glulam beams (130 mm in width, 175 mm in thickness, and 3000 mm in length) used in this study were made from domestic larch and composed of seven layers. The gussets were made of 8-mm-thick steel plates. Creep testing was conducted under constant loads in an uncontrolled environment. The test was carried out in a room that was well ventilated through a window. The creep test specimens were loaded for 33,000 hours. A bending creep test for the glulams was conducted through four-point loading. The applied stresses were 20% and 30% of the MOR in the static bending test for the glulam and bolted glulam, respectively. After 33,000 hours, the creep deflection of the glulam at a 20% stress level increased by 39% to 99%, while the creep deflection of the glulam at a 30% stress level increased by 27% to 67%, as compared with instantaneous elastic deflection. The relative creep increased during autumn and winter, and recovered during spring and summer. The relative creep of the bolted glulams was changed abruptly by loading up to 5,000 hours, but stabilized after 5,000 hours, and then gradually increased until 33,000 hours. The relative creep of the bolted glulam increased 2.11 times on average after 33,000 hours.