Abstract
Portuguese forests have changed in recent years. These changes were mainly boosted by the wildfires that affected a significant percentage of the softwood area. Eucalyptus is actually the dominant wood species in Portuguese forests. This is not a native hardwood, but is being planted mainly for pulp and paper production, and its availability and mechanical performance have made it very present in timber construction in the last 50 years. Within the discussion to substitute imported raw materials, mainly from softwoods, with local hardwoods for the production of engineered wood products, the study of the ability to glue eucalyptus has become a necessity. This paper presents experimental works aimed to assess the ability to glue eucalyptus elements for the production of glued laminated timber (GLT) and cross-laminated timber (CLT). Since this wood species has been known for being difficult to dry, a preliminary study on the dimensional stability under moisture content variation was performed. Then, shear strength tests were made in accordance with ASTM D143. The objective was to correlate those results with the tests performed in the following research step. In this further stage, shear strength tests of the bond line were performed following EN 14080 and EN 16351. The results obtained in all the experiments show that eucalyptus has the potential to be glued and therefore the production of GLT and/or CLT using this local undervalued wood species is potentially of high industrial interest.
Highlights
The increasing political and social demands regarding the use of eco-friendly building materials are leading in recent years to a strong rise in the use of wood due to its CO2 absorption capacity and the quality of renewable natural resource [1]
This paper presents a first step in a wide research program to assess and develop the potential use of local hardwoods species in structural applications
The focus is engineered wood products, namely glued laminated timber (GLT) and cross-laminated timber (CLT), as they represent added value products that can have a direct effect from the national industry perspective
Summary
The increasing political and social demands regarding the use of eco-friendly building materials are leading in recent years to a strong rise in the use of wood due to its CO2 absorption capacity and the quality of renewable natural resource [1]. The Portuguese eucalyptus shows potential to be used in engineered wood products, like glulam and cross-laminated timber (CLT) It is an available hardwood, with a reasonable cost. The bond line quality was evaluated through shear tests following the EN 14080 [19] adopting surface-bonding specimens (GLT) and edge-bonding ones (CLT) following the EN 16351 [20] The aim of those tests is to assess the ability of eucalyptus to be glued using an industrial process in the production of glued elements such as GLT and CLT. Because this mechanical property can be directly correlated with the shear strength of the bond line, shear strength tests on eucalyptus specimens were made according to ASTM D143 [21]
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