Pacific Post and Beam entered three tenons in the Tenon Testing at the 2012 Western Timber Framer’s Guild conference. The tenon pictured above was the third entry, the only one of all the entries that did not get torn apart!
The joint was made with (4) 10 inch long by 1 inch diameter fiberglass rods epoxied into the wood. Though this is not traditional timber framing, we have used similar connections in the past.
Incredibly, there was very little deformation while under a 40,000 lbs load! The surfaces may have pulled about 1/8″ apart. The test was stopped because the limits of the equipment had been reached. There were also safety concerns for the spectators and their beers.