A numerical study of the transverse modulus of wood as a function of grain orientation and properties

Finite element analysis was used to study the effective transverse modulus of solid wood for all possible end-grain patterns. The calculations accounted for cylindrical anisotropy of wood within rectangular specimens and explicitly modeled wood as a composite of earlywood and latewood. The effective modulus was significantly reduced by growth ring curvature or off-axis loading, The large changes were attributed to the low transverse shear modulus of wood. The explicit, or heterogeneous, model was compared to prior numerical methods that homogenized properties in the transverse plane. The two models gave similar effective modulus results, but a heterogeneous model was required to capture details in modulus calculations or to realistically model stress concentrations. Various numerical methods for modeling transverse stresses in wood are discussed.