Reliability-based capacity design of timber connections comprising glued-in steel plates

Connections play a crucial role in timber structures. They not only allow the structural members to be joined together, but also govern the structure's mechanical behavior. Moreover, carefully designed connections provide ductility to the structure. Glued-in steel plates in timber are attractive in applications where high stiffness and capacity are required. To ensure the connection ductility, the steel plate should yield before brittle timber failure occurs. Thus, the design challenge lies in determining the optimal steel plate parameters that maximize the connection capacity and ensure connection ductility. In this study, system reliability is used to determine the optimal steel plate thickness based on an analytical model of the glued-in plate connection. This results in a hierarchical calibration of the failure modes to provide ductility to the system in the event of failure. The proposed framework enables the economical and robust design of glued-in plate connections, supporting their wider adoption in timber structures.

Keywords: weak link, ductility, system reliability, timber engineering, glued-in plates, reliability-based design.