WOOD RESEARCH Volume 63, Number 3, 2018
Wen-Gang Hu, Wei-Lian Fu, and Hui-Yuan Guan

Optimal design of stretchers positions of mortise and tenon joint chair

The chair joined by oval mortise-and-tenon was taken as a case. Then influences of two adjacent sides (side A and side B) stretcher positions on mechanical properties of chairs, including ultimate loading capacity, stiffness and strain distributions, were investigated through using experimental and numerical methods. Firstly, two factors and three levels experiments were conducted and analyzed by Finite Element Method (FEM) . The results showed that ultimate loading capacity of chairs decreased firstly and then increased with the growth of the height of stretchers positions. In addition, the stress concentration occurred at middle of side rails and joints of side rails, especially at the side B, while the stress at the middle of the leg was minimum. Besides, the higher the stretcher position of the side A was, the more harmonious the stress distributions of chair was, and the higher ultimate loading capacity and stiffness were. Moreover, the results of FEM were well consistence with those of experiments, and the errors were within 10%. Secondly, two factors and five levels numerical analysis was conducted to optimize the stretcher positions of chair by the FEM, and the results showed more boadly that the best stretchers positions of chair owning the highest loading capacity was not the only one. Finally, the relationship between ultimate loading capacity and stretcher positions was generated by using the response surface method, and the correlation coefficient was nearly 88%.

WOOD RESEARCH Volume 66, Number 1, 2021
WENGANG HU and Bingrui Chen

Experimental and numerical studies on mechanical behaviors of beech wood under compressive and tensile states

Effect of loading type (compression and tension) on mechanical properties, including elastic constants, yield strength and ultimate strength of beech (Fagus orientalis) wood were studied based on experimental and numerical methods. The mechanical behaviors of beech wood in compressive and tensile states were simulated by finite element method (FEM) using mechanical parameters measured in an experiment. The results showed that the effect of loading types on mechanical properties of beech was statistically significant. The elastic moduli measured in tension were all bigger than those in compression, but the Poisson’s ratios determined in compression were bigger than those in tension. In compressive state, the yield and ultimate strengths of beech in longitudinal grain orientation were all smaller than those measured in tensile state, while the yield and ultimate strengths of beech in radial and tangential directions were higher than those of longitudinal direction. The results of the FEM in compression and tension were all well consistent with those measured by experiments respectively, and the average errors were all within 13.69%. As a result, the finite element models proposed in this study can predict the mechanical behaviors of wood in tensile and compressive states.