Non-linear finite element modelling of the structural behaviour of screwed timber-to-concrete composite connections

This paper discusses a numerical approach, based on beam-to-solid modelling, for the simulation of the nonlinear structural behaviour of timber-to-concrete composite beams made with screws. The present contribution is an alternative to the detailed 3D modelling of the screws using solid elements and simplified approaches which use spring elements at each screw location. The screws were modelled using one-dimensional beam element, while the timber and concrete members were modelled, in detail, using 3D solid elements. To deal with the coupling between the common nodes, the 4-node beam element with only translational degrees of freedom (d.o.f.) per node, recently developed by the authors [1,2], has been extended to nonlinear analysis and employed to model the screws, since the existing 2-node beam element is obviously not fulfilled for screws in timber [2]. The effectiveness of the numerical model developed was verified experimentally showing several advantages by comparison to the existing models in the literature. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.