Compression Strength Perpendicular to the Grain of Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) of the Three Community Wood Species

Abstract

Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) is an engineered wood products composed of multi-layered panel of lumber where each layer of boards is placed cross-wise to adjacent layers. The purpose of the present research was to evaluate the compression strength perpendicular to grain of CLT composed of 5 layers tested with line loads in square surface. The position of line loads was in the centre and edge of sample orientated both in parallel and perpendicular to the grain direction at the CLT-surface. The CLT specimens were (15x20x20) cm3 (thickness, width and length) in size and were prepared from three community timber, i.e. sengon (Paraserianthes falcataria), mindi (Melia azedarach L.), and nangka (Artocarpus heterophyllus Lamk.). The result showed that the edge loading position resulted in lower compression strength than that of the central loading position. The highest comprresion strength was retained by CLT tested in the center loading position oriented to perpendicular to the grain direction. The highest compression strength perpendicular to grain was retained by CLT of nangka wood (20.28 kg cm-2) followed successively by those of CLT of mindi (25.97 kg cm-2) and CLT of sengon(8.50 kg cm-2). Keywords: CLT, compressive strength perpendicular to grain, line load, mindi, nangka, sengon