Temperature-based stiffness identification of Que-Ti’s in a historic Tibetan timber building

![CDATA[Que-Ti, like the corbel brackets connecting beam and column in modern structures, is an important component in typical Tibetan historic timber buildings. It transfers shear, compression and bending moment by slippage and deformation of components as well as limited joint rotation. A rigorous analytical model of Que-Ti is needed for predicting the behaviour of a timber structure under load. However, few researches have been done with this model, particularly on the parameters describing the performances of this joint under load. The equivalent stiffness of a Que-Ti connection in its operating state is determined by using ambient temperature variations as a forcing function in the complete input(temperature)-output(local mechanical strains) relationship when it is incorporated in a finite element model of the structure. The identification is done iteratively via correlating the calculated strain responses with measured data.]]