What Is Glulam and Why Choose It for Your House?

Glulam, or glued laminated timber, is an engineered wood product which produces wider sections and longer length members than sawn lumber. Glulam can be manufactured curved or straight and is most often utilized as structural beams.

Building with wood has long been popular in Europe; however, North American builders have been slower to adopt this form of construction. But this trend is beginning to change.

Strength

Glulam is an extremely strong material with a strength-to-weight ratio that’s nearly three times greater than steel, making it ideal for long span and curved designs that would otherwise be difficult to construct using traditional structural framing methods. Furthermore, hurricaneproof framing applications (especially header and rim board applications) make use of glulam ideal.

Construction of glulam involves laminations (or „lams”) bonded together using durable and moisture resistant structural adhesives, often including laminates made from Douglas-fir, spruce-pine-fir or western hemlock lumber kiln-dried and stress tested before finger jointing into large beams or structures. Knots and other defects have less of an effect on mechanical strength of glued laminated timber due to smaller slats being interlaced within this laminated timber’s composition compared to solid lumber due to having smaller slats interconnecting with solid lumber’s solid lumber solidity.

Gulam beams are more dimensionally stable than solid wood beams due to their manufacturing process and unique physical characteristics, meaning less shrinkage and expansion over time and reduced maintenance costs.

Aesthetics play an integral part in commercial and residential project decisions. Gulam provides an array of aesthetic choices for long-span buildings where maintaining visual integrity is vital; unlike steel which offers limited options even with additional coatings, glulam can be treated to achieve the look and feel you desire.

Glulam is an eco-friendly building solution, often using materials sourced from certified, renewable forests and producing significantly fewer carbon emissions than steel and concrete which involve energy-intensive mining and manufacturing processes. As such, glulam makes an excellent choice for green building projects seeking LEED or BREEAM certification.

Durability

When selecting materials for a building project, durability should always be top of mind. When considering glulam as a material choice for your construction, its superior strength compared to steel allows it to carry more weight while remaining structurally sound without additional support structures being necessary – saving money and resources in the form of reduced support structure costs and costs of additional support structures needed in additional support structures. Furthermore, its lightweight nature requires less connections for creating the same level of strength; making glulam easier to maneuver into tight spaces and lift with cranes!

Glulam structures are constructed using kiln-dried, stress-rated lumber – usually Douglas-fir, SPF or western hemlock – cut into long slats and adhered with weatherproof structural adhesives for weatherproof adhesion. Once assembled they can then be stacked side-by-side, keeping their grain parallel with the length of each beam or member and creating a structure which is stronger, uniform and more dimensionally stable than solid lumber structures.

Gulam construction uses thinner slats that are less susceptible to termite damage and other insects than traditional solid timber structures, thereby using up less forest resources and decreasing environmental impact. Additionally, its small log size permits greater use in its construction process resulting in greater resource utilization and decreased environmental impact.

As a construction material, glulam is more fire-resilient than steel. While steel requires substantial amounts of protective coatings or encasements to remain flame and smoke proof, glulam’s surface remains safe from flame and smoke damage and can be safely removed with little difficulty. Furthermore, as its surface chars at an expected rate it makes designing structures with desired levels of fire protection without additional protective measures possible.

Durability aside, choosing between steel and glulam comes down to your building goals and personal preference. If you require an extremely strong, sustainable framework capable of accommodating intricate, curved or long span designs then glulam might be your go-to material.

Flexibility

Glulam can be formed into long lengths and curved shapes, creating new possibilities for architects and designers. This material can be tailored to meet the structural requirements of every building – be it graceful art museum curves or intricate church trusses – making for creative designs that connect occupants to nature.

Comparable to steel, glulam offers greater strength per unit of material while simultaneously requiring fewer connections and fasteners for assembly on-site, and its natural insulation contributes to reduced energy costs.

Although initially more costly than some alternative construction materials, glulam has several distinct advantages that reduce repair and maintenance expenses over its lifespan. Furthermore, its lightweight nature results in savings on foundation costs; further lowering upfront construction expenses. Furthermore, its sustainable wood source promotes responsible forest practices while helping achieve LEED certifications.

Long-term savings from using glulam are realized via its thermal performance; less energy is used to heat and cool buildings, thus significantly lowering utility costs over time. Furthermore, its dimensional stability helps mitigate swelling or shrinkage over time.

As mass timber becomes an industry trend, glulam stands to become an indispensable building material on modern building sites across Canada and the US. Northwestern Ontario stands out as an area with both robust construction industry and an abundance of forestry species (such as spruce). As Forest Forward suggests, using innovative glulam construction techniques such as heavy truss construction could revitalize our region’s forest industry through utilising smaller trees that otherwise go unharvested due to low demand for lumber products.

Energy Efficiency

Wood is an effective insulator, making glulam buildings built from it an energy-saving choice when considering heating and cooling costs. Coupled with its structural benefits, glulam makes an excellent option for projects seeking LEED certification.

Glulam construction uses renewable forests as its raw material for manufacturing, as opposed to concrete or steel construction which require mining operations and more energy-intensive processes for their creation. Furthermore, being lighter than concrete reduces transportation-related carbon emissions.

Due to its strength, glulam is also much more resilient to seismic and wind loads than concrete structures, enabling greater span lengths without internal supports – providing designers with more options to design columns with wider openings or more floor space.

Prefabrication of glulam components reduces construction time and labor costs while simultaneously lessening environmental impact by decreasing on-site energy use and emissions.

As such, glulam has one of the lowest carbon footprints among building materials, due to wood being an effective carbon sink and its production using far less energy than steel or concrete production processes. Furthermore, renewable energy production technologies and efficient logistical networks further mitigate glulam’s low embodied carbon intensity.

Regional impacts on glulam sustainability differ by region, with Europe and North America leading the cellulose sector with their well-developed policy frameworks, advanced forest governance practices, and technical infrastructure for sustainable production. Meanwhile, Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America suffer from excessive carbon burden caused by unsustainable forestry practices and inefficient production systems that create an energy deficit in these areas.

Environmentally Friendly

Glulam is an eco-friendly building material because it comes from forests that are responsibly managed. Furthermore, its manufacturing process uses significantly less energy than that required for concrete or steel buildings.

Due to its superior strength-to-weight ratio, glulam requires smaller foundations for construction costs to be reduced and is easier to transport and maneuver than heavy metal beams, making installation faster and minimizing risk during transport.

Due to its strength and flexibility, glulam is widely employed across various applications. From its ubiquitous use in residential purlins and ridge beams to creating creative roof systems with curved roof systems – as well as being found in gyms and malls where aesthetics meet functionality – glulam plays an integral part in numerous applications.

Glulam offers high levels of fire resistance. Structures made of glued laminated wood are safer than unprotected steel structures due to charring at a predictable rate, which reduces oxygen consumption and retards combustion, as well as its natural moisture content preventing formation of flammable gases, thus limiting structural damage caused by chemical reactions. Glulam also represents an eco-friendly building solution as it utilizes renewable timber resources while using less energy during manufacture compared with its steel and concrete counterparts; plus at its end of useful life it can be recycled instead compared with concrete/steel counterparts which require substantial amounts of energy production at their production stages!