by Web Editor | Dec 5, 2018 | News
Thanks to innovative construction materials like cross-laminated timber (CLT) and laminated veneer lumber (LVL), wooden buildings are no longer mere houses made of sticks.
Attracted by the aesthetic and environmental benefits of timber, structural engineers have overseen a lumber comeback, from Landlease’s International House development in Sydney’s Barangaroo district to Brisbane’s newly completed 25 King, which is the world’s tallest commercial timber building.
But with ambitious projects in Tokyo, Chicago, and London eyeing far greater heights for timber as a building material, engineers and the public need to be assured wood can match up with concrete and steel when it comes to safety and stability.
That’s why Griffith University’s Associate Professor Benoit Gilbert has been putting timber to the test, using high-tech machinery to better understand how timber behaves in a variety of situations.
Gilbert’s current tests focus on progressive collapse, a term that describes the severe failure of a structure due to something going wrong in one part of it. That could be a gas explosion, a fire or if a car were to collide with the building.
Read more on this from Create at https://www.createdigital.org.au/strength-safety-tests-timber/.
by Web Editor | Oct 31, 2018 | News
Prescriptive requirements for wood structures up to 18 stories were among the additions preliminarily approved for the International Building Code following the work of the International Code Council’s ad-hoc Tall Wood Buildings Committee.
Wood is widely recognized as a carbon-neutral building material, but its use as a structural material has been mostly limited to residential and low-rise buildings due to its combustible nature. Through recent advances in manufacturing and engineering, wood in the form of mass timber products is increasingly attracting interest as a structural system for tall buildings.
Portland, Ore., recently saw the completion of the eight-story Carbon12, currently the tallest wood building in the United States. Still, progress has been slow in this country as compared to Europe or Canada, where the 18-story-tall Brock Commons, in Vancouver, stands as the tallest timber structure in the world. One significant issue inhibiting widespread adoption in the U.S. is prescriptive building codes, which currently limit the height of wood buildings to 85 feet, or six stories. In December 2015, the International Code Council (ICC) formed an ad-hoc committee to study the impact of tall wood buildings on the building code with the membership voting on the adoption of proposed changes on Oct. 24.
The ICC’s International Building Code (IBC) classifies a high-rise building as any building with an occupied floor 75 feet above the lowest level at which fire department vehicles can access. The 2018 IBC defines heavy timber structural members as Type IV construction, which also includes a range of wood products, such as solid sawn timber, glue-laminated members, and composite wood members. The term mass timber, however, comprises both heavy timber as well as engineered products, many of which the IBC does not reference, such as cross-laminated timber (CLT).
Heavy timber construction is currently limited to a height of 85 feet. Architects can design taller wood structures, but they must demonstrate that the design meets the prescribed code and performs as well or better than a similar concrete or steel structure. This can be a costly and time-consuming process, requiring extensive testing and documentation on the part of the design team and building owner.
Read more on this from Architect Magazine at https://www.architectmagazine.com/technology/support-for-tall-timber-reaches-new-heights-in-the-building-code_o.
by Web Editor | Jan 4, 2017 | News
When the 12-story Framework building planned at Portland’s Northwest 10th Avenue and Glisan Street is complete, it may look to passers-by like any other Pearl District condo tower.
But it will hold a special distinction in the sustainable building world: the nation’s tallest building made primarily from mass timber (long pieces of timber, glue-laminated together).
Designers and engineers across the country are chasing an innovative style of mass timber construction pioneered in Europe, which they believe will go a long way to reduce the carbon footprint of large buildings.
The breakthrough came with the development of cross-laminated timber or CLT: Large, layered flat panels used as floors and walls (rather than just beams as vertical posts).
As Oregon moves on multiple fronts to take the national lead in all-wood construction for tall buildings, Portland State University stepped up early to do basic research. PSU won a three-year, $400,000 National Science Foundation grant to study two aspects of mass timber construction: its sustainability and how well it resists earthquakes.
From Sustainable Life: https://pamplinmedia.com/sl/337694-214716-psu-tests-new-green-woods-seismic-strength
by Web Editor | Dec 2, 2016 | News
The seven-story T3 tower features 220,000 square feet of prefabricated CLT timber panels and nail-laminated timber cladding.
It became the largest timber building in the U.S. when it opened Wednesday in Minneapolis. Designed by Vancouver-based Michael Green Architecture and Architect-of-Record DLR Group, the office building is named T3, which stands for Timber, Technology, and Transit.
“As businesses compete to attract and retain staff, T3 offers a modern re-interpretation of the historic building that appeals to young professionals,” says Architect Michael Green. “It celebrates the robust character of historic wood, brick, stone and steel buildings, but provides state of the art amenities, environmental performance, and technical capability needed for competitive businesses in Minneapolis.”
In addition to being constructed of sustainable lumber, the building will sequester about 3,200 tons of carbon.
StructureCraft, who worked on the project, said the building, which resembles nearby historic warehouses in the district, features a structural system around a fifth of the weight of a similarly sized concrete building. StructureCraft says it was able to construct the 180,000 square feet of timber required in less than 10 weeks.
From Woodworking Network: https://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/news/woodworking-industry-news/tallest-timber-building-us-opens-its-doors?ss=news,news,woodworking_industry_news,news,almanac_market_data,news
