Seismic performance of timber buildings: The Series project

This paper describes a shaking-table experimental programme performed on four different multi-storey timber houses within the transnational Seismic Engineering Research Infrastructures for European Synergies (Series) project at the National Laboratory of Civil Engineering in Lisbon, Portugal. The aim of the Series project was to promote cooperation between main European research centres by giving access to their facilities. Under the timber buildings research programme within the Series framework, four real-scale three-storey buildings of plan dimension 7x5m were assembled and tested: two timber-frame houses, one log house and one cross-glued laminated timber house. This paper describes the common parts of the various tests undertaken, such as the test set-up and the measurement layout. The tests themselves are described in a series of companion papers by the authors.