ONE-STOREY TIMBER-FRAMED SHEAR WALLS WITH WINDOW OPENINGS AS PART OF THE LATERAL FORCE-RESISTING SYSTEM

For lateral force-resisting systems of multi-storey timber-framed buildings, the usual policy of current standards in Europe is to only consider wall segments continuous from the ground floor to the top edge of the building and to neglect wall elements with openings. Developing a design method that allows taking wall elements with window openings into account, would make the lateral force-resisting system more efficient and respective buildings more economic. This paper presents experimental investigations on horizontally loaded one-storey wall elements with large window openings. Different window opening sizes and force-transfer optimizations were investigated. The results show that one-storey timber-framed shear wall elements with window openings have sufficient stiffness and strength potential to act contributively to the lateral force-resisting system.