Flexural behavior of five species of Italian Bamboo

The good mechanical performance of bamboo, coupled with its sustainability, has boosted the idea to use it as a structural material. In some areas of the world it is regularly used in constructions but there are still countries in which there is a lack of knowledge of the mechanical properties of the locally-grown bamboo, which limits the spread of this material. Bamboo is optimized to resist to flexural actions with its peculiar micro structure along the thickness in which the amount of fibers intensifies towards the outer layer and the inner part is composed mostly of parenchyma. The flexural strength depends on the amount of fibers, whereas the flexural ductility is correlated to the parenchyma content. This study focuses on the flexural strength and ductility of six different species of untreated bamboo grown in Italy. A four-point bending test was carried out on bamboo strips in two different loading configurations relating to its microstructure. Deformation data are acquired from two strain gauges in the upper and lower part of the bamboo beam. Difference in shape and size of Italian bamboo species compared to the ones traditionally used results in added complexity when performing the tests. Such difficulties and the found solutions are also described in this work. The main goal is to reveal the flexural behavior of Italian bamboo as a functionally graded material and to expand the knowledge of European bamboo species toward its use as a structural material not only as culm but also as laminated material.