International Conference Wind Effects on Trees

September 16-18, 2003, University of Karlsruhe, Germany

FAILURE MODES FOR TREES AND RELATED CRITERIA

C. Mattheck, K. Bethge, R. Kappel, P. Mueller, I. Tesari
Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe GmbH
in der Helmholtz-Gemeinschatft
Institut for Materials Research II
Hermann-von-Helmholtz-Platz 1
D-76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen

Abstract

Summary: The most important failure modes for trees are explained, VTA-warning signals
(Visual Tree Assessment) are shown where available and failure criteria from field studies
are given for the individual failure modes. As not all failures are predictable therefore not all
tree accidents cause liability.

1. Introduction

The failure of trees can cause severe damage to people and goods. Liability may come into
account if the failure has been predictable.

In the last decade the VTA-method (Visual Tree Assessment, Mattheck et al 1995, Mattheck
1999, and Mattheck 2002) has become a worldwide distributed method for tree diagnosis. So
arborists from Australia and New Zealand, Singapore over Europe to America use VTA to
assess the safety of their trees. VTA is based on the Axiom of uniform stress which is a
major design rule for load carrying biological systems. It says that load-adaptive growth in
living structures attaches more material at overloaded spots and less or even no material at
underloaded parts of the structure. A uniform stress may be reached, maintained or restored
after disturbance. In this sense the tree tries to be a chain of equally strong links. However
defects, injuries or simply lack of material supply (caused by phototropic growth) may lead to
a non-uniform load distribution and this can cause failure.

In order to predict this, a deep understanding of failure modes and related failure criteria is
necessary. In this paper the current state of knowledge on this subject is outlined.

2. Hollow trees

If a tree becomes more and more hollow a failure by cross-sectional flattening may happen.
Figure 1 shows how a hollow tree may fail by collapse of its cross-section like a water hose
under bending load.

Field studies have been done on different continents and gave a threshold for failure of trees
with full sail (non-pruned trees!) at a ratio of 70 % hollowness. That means, if approximately
70 % of the radius are decayed or hollow, then the probability of failure suddenly increases.
 Fig. 1: Failure mode of a hollow tree by cross-sectional flattening

Fig. 2: Standing and broken hollow trees from a field study in the USA, Europe and Australia

In Figure 2 the results of these field studies are shown (Mattheck 2002, Mattheck et al 1993).
Failure starts at a ratio
(Inner radius Ri) / (outer radius Ro) = 0.65 0.7.

Alexander and Currey (Currey et al 1985) showed that land mammal bones are normally less
hollow than 70 % ! The bamboo delays cross-sectional flattening by stiffening inserts which
obviously prevent from water hose-like bending failure.
3. Failure due to slenderness

Trees in dense stands, trees growing very close to buildings or trees without lower branches
(wrong pruning: lion tails!) normally have a small crown growing very high for phototropic
reasons. This small crown has to supply now assimilates for wood production in a long stem
which is without any green in its lower parts. Therefore, tree rings of normal size grow only in
the upper part of the stem close to the canopy and the lower parts of the stem near the butt
and the roots are neglected and very thin tree rings grow there. This is drawn simplified in
Figure 3 taken from Mattheck 2002. This way the conical shape of the stem is growing into a
more cylindrical one and the tapering disappears. And this is an alarming signal!

A field study (Mattheck 2002, Mattheck et al 2002) based on about 2500 trees showed that if
trees are not very young a threshold of

Height / DBH (Diameter at Breast Height) 50

exists (Figure 4) for solitary growing trees or trees in thinned stands. Trees with higher
slenderness have the risk to be first bend sideward by wind and than being pulled down by
the weight of their crown. This may get worse by rain or wet snow. A simple tool was
developed for measuring slenderness and tree height (Figure 5).

Fig. 3: Dangerous slenderness created by growth localized in the upper parts of the trunk
Fig. 4: Result of Fieldstudy: H/D 50 is dangerous for trees standing without support from neighbours

Fig. 5: Tool for measuring tree slenderness

4. Failure due to crack formation

4.1. Hazard beam cracks

Every curved piece of wood straightened by bending can split longitudinally. Figure 6 shows
the principle and some examples in the tree.

An especially dangerous hazard beam is the one in the buttress of the root on the windward
side. A failure here may lead to the separation of a fibre bundle followed by the complete
breakage of the trunk. Also hazard beams with a slack tensile rope which can be suddenly
loaded can lead to dynamic forces. Especially trees with small rays, which means laterally
weak trees, are subject to the formation of those cracks.

Fig. 6: Hazard beam crack

4.2. Shear cracks

When a lateral wind force acts on a tree the trunk is loaded by bending and shear. Figure 7
taken from Mattheck 2002 illustrates lateral and axial shear. However, in a well tapered tree
the shear should be highest where the cross-section of the trunk is smallest. Nevertheless in
most of the cases the shear cracks occur at the tree base. In Figure 8 the tension and
compression force flow is shown. They cross each other in the center of the tree butt. From
basic mechanics it is known (Mattheck et al 2003) that the planes of maximum shear are
shifted by 45 from the planes of principal tension and compression stresses. Calculations
using the Finite Element Method (FEM) have shown that the shear maximum localized in the
tree butt may have nearly 50 times (!) higher shear stress as one can find higher up in the
trunk and this is the cause for the vertical shear crack formation along the grain in the tree
base (Figure 9).
 Fig. 7: Regular shear due to lateral force

Fig. 8: Shear bombs in the tree base due to crossing tensile and compressive stresses
Fig. 9: FEM-calculation gives about 46 times higher shear stress in the base of the trunk than higher
up

4.2. Banana Cracks

Take a fresh banana and bend it straight. It may split longitudinally along the convex side,
like a curved tree can do (Figure 10 taken from Mattheck 1999). As it is shown in Mattheck et
al 1997 the trees try to prevent from this failure by creating circumferential compressive
growth stresses. In this way the spindle shaped ray cross-sections which may act like crack
starters when laterally pulled are precompressed (Figure 11). Banana cracks are started
when the circumferential tension stress overcomes the compressive growth stress together
with the tangential strength of the tree. It is however rare, to see a complete tree failure due
to a banana crack.

5. Failure due to loss of growth stresses

A very common failure mode in Angiosperms is the branch drop due to relaxation of the
tension wood muscle. Figure 12 shows the visual symptoms in different stages. If the
tension wood is still growing on the top-side of the vigorous branch one can see the growth
striations in between the bark plates there on top.

If the tension wood gets slack and is not formed anymore it behaves like a weak muscle.
Now the lower side of the branch is increasingly loaded in compression and lignin-rich
supporting wood is growing therefore now at the lower side. Supporting wood cannot expand
Fig. 10: Subsidence cracking occurs when curved parts of the tree are straightened. It brings to mind
the way a fresh banana splits open if it is bend straight

Fig. 11: A disk of wood cracks radially if the ray spindles are loaded laterally by tension due to drying
like the compression wood in Gymnosperms. Therefore it can not re-correct the branch angle
but it can prevent from further subsidence of the branch. If even the supporting wood fails by
fibre buckling the tensile-loaded bark on the upper side of the branch will pop off and the
bark on the lower side will show folds or zig-zag lines and the next step is the branch drop.

Leaning trees behave like branches and therefore show the same warning signals. However
a progressively leaning tree may fail by uprooting in most of the cases (Figure 13) or more
seldom by shear cracking.

Fig. 12: Symptoms of subsidence in Angiosperm branches

6. Windthrow and the chain of equally strong links

Over 2500 windthrown trees were measured during field studies on different continents. The
result (Mattheck 2002) is plotted in Figure 14, where the correlation between stem radius
measured just above the buttresses and vertical radius of the root plate is shown. Healthy
trees not growing in too dense stands are on the top level (upper envelope of the cloud of
dots).

Taking this values of the root plate radius for a given stem radius of a non-windthrown, still
standing tree and by measuring the shear strength of the soil, one can calculate the bending
moment necessary for windthrow from the simple biomechanical model in Figure 15 where
also the formulae for the bending moment correlated to stem breakage is shown. With those
simple approaches one can intercompare the measured bending moment necessary to pull a
tree down in the field with the bending moments calculated for stem breakage and wind
throw respectively (Figure 16). All given trees are from a nearly similar diameter (between
0.27 m and 0.30 m). The difference between the measured pulling moment and the slightly
higher theoretical stem breaking moment is produced by the weight of the bended stem and
crown, for which the lever arm adds an additional amount to the throwing moment of the tree.
Fig. 13: Symptoms of a progressive lean and failure modes of a leaning tree

Fig. 14: The windthrow diagram

Fig. 15: A simple model to calculate critical bending moments for stem breakage and windthrow. (The
root ball is not semi spherical but a segment of a sphere adjusted to natural root plates!)

The difference decreases with increasing H/D-ratio (trees with a little crown), and the
measured graph slopes down because the tree with a higher H/D-ratio is unable to spend
enough resources for a strong root plate.

Also, these smaller root plates are reflected in the theoretical moment of the root plate. The
smaller diameter of the plate leads to a smaller amount of transmittable moment into the
surrounding soil. Even with this simple theory there is a good agreement with the field
measurements which have to be continued to give more statistic impact.

One can further conclude that also the tree base tries to be a chain of equally strong links
because the calculated failure moment for stem breakage is close to the failure moment for
windthrow and only this makes sense.
 Failure moments of trees vs. H/D- ratio
160000
due to pull- down (measured)
140000
due to stem- breakage (calculated)
120000
due to windthrow (calculated)
Moment [Nm]

100000

80000

60000

40000

20000

0
50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120
H/D

Fig. 16: Comparison of failure moments experimentally measured at trees pulled down with the
theoretical values

References

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rd
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nd
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