Abstract
This paper provides innovative and effective instruments for the simplified analysis of serviceability limit states for pitched, kinked, and tapered GLT beams. Specifically, formulas for the evaluation of maximal horizontal and vertical displacements are derived from a recently-proposed Timoshenko-like non-prismatic beam model. Thereafter, the paper compares the proposed serviceability analysis formulas with other ones available in literature and with highly-refined 2D FE simulations in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed instruments. The proposed formulas lead to estimations that lie mainly on the conservative side and the errors are smaller than 10% (exceptionally up to 15%) in almost all of the cases of interest for practitioners. Conversely, the accuracy of the proposed formulas decreases for thick and highly-tapered beams since the beam model behind the proposed formulas cannot tackle local effects (like stress concentrations occurring at bearing and beam apex) that significantly influence the beam behavior for such geometries. Finally, the proposed formulas are more accurate than the ones available in literature since the latter ones often provide non-conservative estimations and errors greater than 20% (up to 120%).
Highlights
On the basis of such a work, this paper aims at i) detailing the derivation of formulas capable to estimate quantities of interest for practitioners during the serviceability limit state analysis; ii) validating the obtained results through the systematic comparison with other formulas existing in literature and with highly-refined numerical solutions for a large number of cases of practical interest, and iii) demonstrating that the proposed instruments significantly increase the accuracy of the serviceability states analysis
This paper derives several formulas for the simplified analysis of serviceability limit states from a recently proposed Timoshenko-like model for a non-prismatic beam
The resulting formulas provide an accurate prediction of the maximal displacements
Summary
This trend benefits from the technologies adopted in modern production plants that allow to obtain structural elements with complex geometries without significant increase of the production costs. Looking at the design of wooden structures, the high ratio between the wood strength and stiffness leads the serviceability limit states to be often more restrictive than the ultimate limit states
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