Timber Structures and Engineering

This book contains papers presented at the 1st International Conference on Timber Structures, which was held in collaboration with the Technical Centre of Wood Industry in Belgium. It explores the latest developments in wood products and their application as structural components. The focus of the included works is to draw attention to new research and real applications from both researchers and practitioners, and to present new and innovative ideas in this significant field.

Rapid advances have recently been made in the development and processing of innovative ecologically friendly wood products. A variation of new structural shapes can now be fabricated and used to construct buildings and bridges that have minimal impact on the environment. Wood is particularly appealing since it is renewable and has no carbon footprint when it is harvested in a sustainable way. Timber structures are ecologically sound and comparatively low cost. The material lends itself to ground-breaking designs and new types of composites offer reliable, robust and safe materials.

The content of this book comprises a range of topics: Material properties of wood; Durability aspects, service life modelling; Fire safety of timber structures; Protection against decay; Non-destructive inspection and monitoring; Glued, laminated structures, Xlam and CLT; Timber joints and connections; Vernacular wood and heritage timber structures; Timber housing and eco-architecture; Timber bridges; Large span timber roof structures; Shell structures in timber; Mixed, composite and hybrid structures; Computational analysis and experimental methods; Structural engineering and design; Seismic behaviour of timber structures; Protection of timber; Repaired timber structures; Rapidly assembled and transferable timber structures; Guidelines, codes and regulations; Structural failures; Art and craftsmanship.