How high can a wood shear wall be?
How high can a wood shear wall be?
(OP)
I designed some concentic frames to brace a soft-story condition under a two story timber frame structure. Its in seismic zone 4 and the buildings are in danger of falling over in a large seimic event. The frames turned out to be to expensive to build. I'm now re-designing with shear walls, however some of the buildings are 18'-0" off the ground. I can't find an unbraced height limit for shear walls...only the cbc 2:1 height to width ratio. Any one know how high the code allows? Can I frame it with 4x10 to help resist out of plane bulking?






RE: How high can a wood shear wall be?
Remember too, Architects really love 10" wide studwalls.
Mike McCann
McCann Engineering
RE: How high can a wood shear wall be?