Quasi-static behavior of moment-carrying steel–wood doweled joints

• Dowel-joints involving wood and steel were experimentally and numerically studied.
• Influence of dowels spacing on load-carrying capacity and stiffness was analyzed.
• Numerical analysis considering a mixed-mode cohesive damage model was performed.
• Numerical tool is apt to define the best dowels position to avoid brittle failure.

Dowel-joints involving wood and steel plates were experimentally and numerically studied. The main objective was to analyze the influence of dowels spacing and dowel-to-end distance on load carrying capacity and stiffness of the structure. A particular attention was dedicated to failure type observed in the experiments, particularly the crack path in the vicinity of the dowels. A three-dimensional finite element analysis considering mixed-mode (I/II/III) cohesive zone modeling was performed. It was verified that the numerical model is able to reproduce with good accuracy the initial stiffness, ultimate load, locus of the damaged zone and the crack path observed in the experiments.