A Model for Viscoelastic Consolidation of Wood-Strand Mats. Part I. Structural Characterization of the Mat Via Monte Carlo Simulation

A procedure using Monte Carlo simulation was developed to characterize the spatial structure of randomly formed, wood-strand mats. The simulation reproduces the number of strands in the centroids of imaginary strand columns of finite size. The vertical distances between the adjacent strands and the location of the column centroid relative to the constant length of each strand are also simulated. A data base was collected on realistic mats produced from strands of constant size and non-planar geometries (i.e., random bow, cup, and twist). The procedure can be used in a model for predicting the mechanical behavior of random strand mats during consolidation