Wondering if anyone can point me in the direction of any advice from standards/codes around the world in relation to the spacing requirements (and any other requirements) for staggered fixings in timber.

My own local code in NZ only has typical spacing and edge distance rules for screws/nails and bolts in regular aligned columns/rows subject for loading perpendicular and parallel to the grain. My brief searches have come up with nothing regarding any local rules for staggered fixings layouts.

My intuition tells me and the Eurocode rules below seem to agree that where for a certain direction of loading that if the fixings are not strictly in a row or column that there might be a closer spacing allowed or maybe a higher capacity can be achieved depending on the mode of failure.

The only thing I found so far was in Eurocode which states the following, but wondering how other codes might treat this situation?



Our code does not look at modes of failure like say Eurocode approach does, though its coming in a recent draft.



Thanks.