A new approach to obtain flat nail embedding strength of double-sided nail plate joints

Embedding strength is recognized as a very important property in any dowel type timber joints since it affects bearing performance, load carrying capacity and failure mode of the joint. In this paper, using an inverse modelling technique effective flat nail embedding strengths of double-sided nail plate joints were predicted based on single-tooth 3-D finite element models. In those models, timber was treated as an orthotropic elasto-perfect plastic material, and steel nail as a rigid body. The predicted embedding strengths were compared with experimental ones and good correlation was obtained. Using the predicted embedding strength, the overall joint behaviour was simulated and validated against the corresponding experimental results. This paper presents a new approach to obtain embedding strength of double-sided nail plate joints.