This research experimentally examined the strength, failure modes, and behaviors of dowel-bearing and fiber-bearing wood beam-column connections and explored the effects of cyclic loading on the strength, failure modes, and behaviors of those connections. Base on limited numbers of exploratory laboratory tests (6 preliminary tests in total), the authors observed that the typical bolted connection (dowel-bearing type wood beam-column connection with fiber-bearing surfaces) showed good behavior (large peak moment) under the monotonic loads, and the tenon joint connection (fiber-bearing wood beam-column connection) showed good behavior under cyclic loads. The cyclic property of loading reduced the strength of the dowel-bearing type wood beam-column connections, but increased the strength of fiber-bearing type wood beam-column connections. More importantly, the authors identified a possible location of safety concern in current national design specifications (NDS) standards for the typical bolted connection (dowel-bearing connection with fiber bearing surface) under cyclic loading because the tested value was smaller than the NDS calculated value. But, because of the small amount of tests conducted, no final conclusion can be drawn based on those preliminary observations yet. A large number of repetitive laboratory tests should be conducted.
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