The influence of the loading orientation with respect to the grain direction of wood and the influence of the lateral dowel displacement boundary condition on the embedment behaviour of steel dowels in laminated veneer lumber (with parallel-laminated veneers) are investigated in this study. For limit states of the lateral boundary condition, the load-displacement behaviour was experimentally studied by means of full-hole embedment tests on screw-reinforced laminated veneer lumber, for two dowel diameters and up to large dowel displacements. A novel biaxial test set-up is proposed for embedment tests with constrained lateral dowel displacement boundary condition, in order to quantify laterally evoked reaction forces. Corresponding forces were found to change orientation with increasing dowel displacement and amounted to about 20% and 40% of the vertical reaction force for dowel displacements of 5 mm and twice the dowel diameter, respectively. The influence of the lateral displacement boundary condition was highlighted by comparison of the test data with a previously established data set for unconstrained embedment testing. Constrained loading showed a stiffer response and higher nominal embedment stresses, as well as a more pronounced displacement hardening, compared to unconstrained loading.
KEYWORDSanisotropy, displacement boundary condition, full-hole embedment tests, reinforced laminated veneer lumber, stiffness Notation: d, dowel diameter; R a , arithmetic average of the surface roughness; ini , initial load-to-grain angle; , current load-to-grain angle; , change of loading direction; u v , vertical dowel displacement; u h , horizontal dowel displacement; u sec , secant dowel displacement; u M,v , vertical machine displacement; u M,h , horizontal machine displacement;u M,v , displacement rate;u load M,v , displacement rate at loading;u unload M,v , displacement rate at unloading; f hv , vertical embedment stress; f hh , horizontal embedment stress; f h , resultant embedment stress; F hv , vertical embedment force; F hh , horizontal embedment force; F h , resultant embedment force; F est hv , estimated quasielastic load limit; K unload elast , quasielastic unloading stiffness; K unload plast , elastoplastic unloading stiffness; K load elast , quasielastic loading stiffness; K load plast , elastoplastic loading stiffness; K reload elast , quasielastic reloading stiffness; f hv,5mm , embedment strength acc. to EN 383; f hv,2d , embedment strength at a dowel displacement of two times the dowel diameter; f hv,0.02d , embedment strength determined by 0.02d offset of the quasielastic loading stiffness; f hv,yield , embedment yield strength; f hv,EC5 , embedment strength calculated acc. to Eurocode 5, Eqs. (8.31-8.33); xx , engineering strain in grain direction; yy , engineering strain perpendicular to the grain; xy , engineering shear strain;Strain. 2017;53:e12238.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/str