Hey, while trying to get enough stiffness out of wood shear walls, I've run across the HDU holdowns and OSB as the stiffest options. But try as I might, I can't find anything online talking about plywood vs. OSB for shear walls. Is there a disadvantage for OSB? Why doesn't everyone use OSB since it has something like double the stiffness? Would it be wrong of me to start using OSB as my shear wall default?
Tek-Tips is the largest IT community on the Internet today!
Members share and learn making Tek-Tips Forums the best source of peer-reviewed technical information on the Internet!
-
Congratulations TugboatEng on being selected by the Eng-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!
OSB shear walls stiffer than ply - is OSB or ply the industry norm?
- Thread starter AaronMcD
- Start date
I have been using the OSB or Plywood interchangeably for shear walls. WE always specify either or as acceptable so long as the grade is what we have specified (usually Structural 1). I frankly was not aware the stiffness is different between the two. How do you figure that?
- Thread starter
- #4
I'm sure I'm not the only one here who has pulled handfuls of OSB out of a wall that had a leak. But in my area, if you specified plywood on a shear wall its very likely you would either get a phone call asking to substitute for OSB or you'd go on site and see OSB on the wall.
NorthCivil
Civil/Environmental
The Canadian wood design manual lists OSB and plywood as equivalent for shearwall strength. I imagine there must be a fair amount of research to back it up.
Coming from the wet coast, i think building envelope issues have been more or less sorted in the past 10 years where it is reasonable to assume that your wall will stay mostly dry - at least not saturated for a long time, where rot would start to be an issue. And buildings that begin to rot are usually addressed within a few years.
One thing that still bothers me about OSB shearwalls though, is I am unsure how nth cycles of wetting and drying would affect the integrity of the panels, even if the OSB doesnt stay wet long enough to rot. Also there is the issue of the OSB getting wet during the construction - OSB swells and the nail head will partially puncture the panel.
Coming from the wet coast, i think building envelope issues have been more or less sorted in the past 10 years where it is reasonable to assume that your wall will stay mostly dry - at least not saturated for a long time, where rot would start to be an issue. And buildings that begin to rot are usually addressed within a few years.
One thing that still bothers me about OSB shearwalls though, is I am unsure how nth cycles of wetting and drying would affect the integrity of the panels, even if the OSB doesnt stay wet long enough to rot. Also there is the issue of the OSB getting wet during the construction - OSB swells and the nail head will partially puncture the panel.
- Status
Similar threads
- Locked
- Question
- Question
