In order to study the effect of stiffness and rise-span ratio on the mechanical performance of K6 single-layer glulam reticulated shells, the experiments, including load cases of full-span and half-span loading, and inner-ring failure load, were conducted on four models with a span of 4 m, rise-span ratios of 1/10 and ⅕ and two kinds of joints with single and double row bolts. The results show that the top nodal displacements are the largest, then the inner ring, and the second ring is the smallest in different loading stages. The rise-span ratio has a great influence on the initial stiffness of the model. Compared with full-span loading, rise-span ratio has an higher impact on the stiffness under half-span loading. Under the action of failure load, the rise-span ratio has more influence on the loading value when the deflection reaches l/400 (l is the length of span), and the joint stiffness has more influence on the increase of loading value when the second crack occurs. The larger the rise-span ratio is, the easier the specimen will crack due to the stress concentration at the joint. But the increase of the joint stiffness will be beneficial to restrain the occurrence of the second crack and slow down the stiffness degradation of the specimen; the specimens with large rise-span ratio can be easily damaged, and specimens with small rise-span ratio can occur instability destruction. © 2017, Editorial Office of Journal of Building Structures. All right reserved.
