Ipe Hardwood
Ipe Hardwood
(OP)
Has anyone ever worked with Ipe Hardwood and have design values for the lumber?
They are not in the AWC NDS, but I found some values in the Dept of Agriculture website, but these values need to be decreased and I am looking for an idea of by how much.
They are not in the AWC NDS, but I found some values in the Dept of Agriculture website, but these values need to be decreased and I am looking for an idea of by how much.






RE: Ipe Hardwood
http://www.advantagelumber.com/ipedecking.htm
Brad
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Luckily this is for a residence as opposed to commercial practices, however, the landscape architect hired me on to check his drawings for structural items and this is one last "loophole" left to close that I was hoping some direction would be provided on.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Meaning you think it should be 2,250 psi as opposed to 22,500?
RE: Ipe Hardwood
http://ipe-wood.com/tech.html.htm
RE: Ipe Hardwood
RE: Ipe Hardwood
12,400psi is listed for doug fir. I think we can agree that no combination of adjustment factors would get you there...
They do list this as 'Bending STRENGTH' as opposed to an allowable stress. I'm used to working with wood in ASD, so I imagine the strength is much higher, but I dont think the NDS and grading agencies would be very popular if they applied an FOS of 10+..
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Where can I find design values for tropical hardwoods, imported species, or other species not listed in the NDS Supplement?
First check Table 2.1 - List of Sawn Lumber Species Combinations beginning on page 4 of the NDS Supplement. Design values for the species listed in the NDS Supplement are provided by the grading agencies.
The 2005 NDS supplement Table 4F has non-North American visually graded dimension lumber including:
Austrian Spruce - Austria and the Czech Republic
Douglas Fir/European Larch - Austria, Czech Republic, Bavaria (Germany)
Montane Pine - South Africa
Norway Spruce - Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, Germany, NE France, Switzerland, Romania, Ukraine, Sweden
Scots Pine - Austria, Czech Republic, Romania, Ukraine, Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, Germany, Sweden
Silver Fir - Germany, NE France, Switzerland
Southern Pine - Misiones Argentina
As for other foreign species such as mahogany, ipe, greenheart, etc., or domestic species such as ash, locust, magnolia, walnut, etc., there is some design information in the Wood Handbook published by the US Dept of Agriculture Forest Service, which can be found at http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us. However, since these values are average unadjusted ultimate values, they need to be adjusted per applicable ASTM standards, such as ASTM D245, to arrive at allowable properties. A further complication is that if lumber is not grade stamped in accordance with American Lumber Standard Committee (ALSC) rules:http://www.alsc.org/, there is no way of knowing what type of product will be used in construction. Engineering judgment will be required to use these types of foreign species in structural applications.
Also - The Wood Handbook referenced above has Chapter 5 (found here: Wood Handbook Chapter 5 which shows material properties for IPE (see page 23)
I've attached the relevant table for IPE.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Another thing I found out that was that the dust from sawing and sanding is irritating to one's lungs.
It looks awesome, and I love how it came out. A total bear to work with though.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Graybeach - bet you burned through some skillsaw blades with that stuff!
RE: Ipe Hardwood
"I have a $12k stack of Cumaru at a friends place (hobby). "
Sorry, couldn't resist, that comment read funny to me.... I'd like a $12k stack of anything, and I would never leave it at anyone's house.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I guess one might say I have a bit of a wood collecting problem. :)
Brad
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I feel your pain.
I currently have about 400 sq ft of Brazilian Tigerwood Flooring, about 350 sq ft of clear cedar 5/4x6 decking along with numerous clear cedar 2x4's and countless other building materials in my possession (including enough carpet to do a small house).
I don't know why. None of it is for projects at my house. People have asked to buy them, but I cant let go. Luckily none of it is at my house.
I think everyone has a buddy that is "that guy" that is the part time builder/DIY guy.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Cause you NEVER know when you may need a circular piece of gyp board or a box of ceramic tile pieces, that's why!
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I moved the home my parents built on the family farm in the early 70's and have been working on that since 2005. I wish I never would have started it.
Brad
RE: Ipe Hardwood
The decimal place is correct, it is just reporting a completely different value. As JAE quoted from the American Wood Council's website....
"However, since these values (in the woodhandbook) are average unadjusted ultimate values, they need to be adjusted per applicable ASTM standards, such as ASTM D245, to arrive at allowable properties."
These "adjustments" include three things. 1) A load duration factor. 2) A safety factor 3) A 5% offset to adjust for the high COV in wood. So, just like you have large differences between E and Emin, you'll have a big difference between these values.
I know of some engineers that use the woodhandbook to find "equivalent" species that they are more used to working with. So, if IPE is supposedly stronger than doug-fir, they would use doug-fir values. This isn't quite right as it doesn't take into account a difference in COV, but it is something. They just up their factor of safety, I guess.
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Load duration factor is something applied by the designer to allowable stresses. Unless we're dealing with dead load, it will only increase an allowable stress.
But anyway, since IPE's ultimate bending strength is higher than the allowable bending stress of A36 steel I'm going to start specifying IPE W-shapes to get LEED points.
"All W-shapes shall be extruded from solid Ipe heartwood grade Fu=22.5ksi"
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I wonder if all this LEED stuff won't eventually lead (no pun intended) to using bamboo on a large scale in the US. I know we could grow a lot right here in Florida, stuff grows worse than weeds here...
RE: Ipe Hardwood
Just looked at an older version of the Wood Handbook (dated March 1999) and it gave the same values for doug-fir. So unless they happened to make the same mistake for over a decade...
RE: Ipe Hardwood
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I have 20' x 16' X 60' long deck made from Ipe, Brazilian Ironwood, The deck was built with 18" joist spacing, I was scared of the recommend 24" for the 3/4" boards.. The decking is anchored with Eb-Ty using 316 SS square drive screws with a 17 point. The Eb-Ty requires a biscuit slow which was cut with no problem. I tried to let the wood dry out a little more but the wife wouldn't have it. There are no fasteners visible on the deck. Using screws isn't a problem if you use 17 point.
There is one big caveat with the use of Ipe and that is you have to seal the cut ends with a wax emulsion type sealer. This is the same a they seal logs at many of the saw mills.
If you want to go with visible fasteners checkout Trimscrew. They slso sell the decking now.
When I constructed my deck the diamond people w ere quite helpful.
http://www.diamonddecking.com/compare.htm
http://www.ebty.com/
http://www.cepcotool.com/bowrench/
http://www.trimscrew.com/TRIM-SCREW.htm
RE: Ipe Hardwood
I also remember the edges and corners of the steps were almost perfectly square and sharp, and the finish was as smooth and slippery as glass. Two bad ideas if your feet are wet...
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: Ipe Hardwood
As for the finish, I am sure that finish was more about selling boats and less about safety. Many deck finsihes have components within to make them easier to walk on.
Brad
RE: Ipe Hardwood
The builder was named Perfection Yachts.
I think that particular boat, and that hyper-fussy owner, put them out of business, or at least induced them to change their business name.
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA