Experimental Study on Lateral Resistance of Cross-Laminated Timber Shear Walls with Innovative Energy-Dissipating Connections

Abstract:

To investigate the lateral performance of the cross-laminated timber （CLT） shear walls connected by innovative energy-dissipating connections with a mechanism of “yielding of soft steel” and “shear deformation of rubber”， a series of monotonic and reversed cyclic loading tests were conducted on six full-scale specimens with a height of 2.4 meters， considering various factors including vertical load distributions， aspect ratios， and replaceability of the energy-dissipating connections. A comparative test was also conducted on a CLT wall specimen with common metal connections. The failure process， mechanical properties， and the influence of preset factors were obtained and analyzed. The results indicate that the damage of the CLT walls with the innovative energy-dissipating connections mainly concentrates on the dissipative connections with yielding fracture of the soft-steel dissipative sections and debonding failure of the rubber， preventing the CLT panels and screws from damage. The increase of the vertical load effectively enhances the lateral resistance performance of the wall， while the increase of aspect ratio mainly improves the deformation capacity and ductility of the wall. Compared with the wall with common metal connections， the load-carrying capacity of the wall with energy-dissipating connections is similar， but its ductility increases by 26%， energy dissipation capability increases by 38%， and the maximum inter-story drift can reach 1/23. Moreover， the lateral performance of the wall repaired by the in-situ replacement of the energy-dissipating connections is similar to that of the original wall. The results indicate that the CLT shear walls connected by innovative energy-dissipating connections exhibits an excellent seismic performance， which can achieve the design objective of replaceable connections and repairable structures after a strong earthquake.