Abstract
The development of innovative engineered wood products (EWPs) has greatly increased the possibility of using timber as structural material, opening new markets in the construction sectors, such as multi-storey residential buildings and collective (e.g. schools) buildings. Despite a revival of popularity of the entire wood sector, timber structures still face constraints and limitations that they need to overcome to offer new opportunities for green buildings. The use of timber structures primarily confined to low- and mid-rise buildings, the poor efficiency and optimisation in the use of wood in buildings made with mass timber panels, the production process of EWPs strongly linked to big wood industries and not still affordable for small local companies, the limited attention to the dismantling process and re-use of timber structural elements are some examples of such limitations. In order to overcome existing constraints in the timber sector, the HyWood4buildings project proposes a novel hybrid wooden structural system composed of two separates but interacting wooden structural systems: 1) a solid-sawn wall system (SoN-Wall), designed primarily to resist gravitational loads, and 2) an innovative hybrid steel-timber composite lateral load resisting (HyST-LaR) system, designed to ensure the stability and resilience of taller buildings under lateral loads. The HyWood4building system aims to combine the structural performance of EWPs with the advantages of using local and readily available solid-sawn components, in order to: 1) develop an innovative high-performance wooden structural system capable of resisting high lateral loads in taller timber buildings; 2) optimize the use of EWPs thanks to a smart combination of mass timber panels and solid-sawn structural elements; 3) support the development of local supply chains through a larger, yet efficient, use of solid-sawn structural elements; 4) assess and exploit new opportunities from the dismantling and re-use of timber structural elements. The limits and potentialities of existing wood-based structural systems adopted in the construction of multi-storey buildings will be firstly investigated and two case studies will be identified. The design of the HyWood4buildings structural system will be carried implementing an innovative multi-objective approach. Experimental tests at component (i.e. connections and solid-sawn wall system) and system level (HyST-LaR) will be conducted in order to evaluate the mechanical performances of the proposed structural system. Advanced numerical analyses will be conducted for the update of the prediction models and the optimisation of the proposed structural system.
Project details
Unibo Team Leader: Luca Pozza
Unibo involved Department/s:
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Civile, Chimica, Ambientale e dei Materiali
Coordinator:
CNR - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche(Italy)
Total Unibo Contribution: Euro (EUR) 52.456,00
Project Duration in months: 24
Start Date:
28/09/2023
End Date:
28/02/2026
