Connections and Fasteners
What are Connections and Fasteners?
RedBuilt Connections & Fasteners are structural hangers, connectors, and fastening systems engineered to work as a system with RedBuilt's line of Red-I™ Joists, RedLam™ LVL, and mass timber products like Glulam.
From joist hangers to concealed mass timber connectors, every connection is selected and detailed to match the load path, and installation sequence of the RedBuilt system.
Why?
A structure is only as strong as its connections. Undersized hardware, mismatched fastener schedules, or field substitutions are among the most common sources of failed inspections, change orders, and callback costs on commercial wood projects.
Specifying connections alongside the framing system — rather than leaving hardware selection to the field — keeps the load path, fire rating, and code compliance intact from design through construction.
Benefits
Engineered as a system
Connectors are matched to the load, span, and fire requirements of the RedBuilt product they're paired with, not selected generically after the fact.
Code compliance built in
Hardware is selected and detailed to current ICC-ES evaluation reports and the AWC National Design Specification® (NDS) connection provisions, reducing RFIs and inspection delays.
Fewer jobsite surprises
Pre-specified connections mean crews aren't making hardware substitutions in the field, which keeps schedules and budgets intact.
One point of accountability
Your RedBuilt technical representative can speak to the framing system and its connections together, instead of splitting that conversation across two vendors.
Characteristics
Connections and fasteners used across RedBuilt systems generally fall into the following categories:
Category
Dowel-type fasteners
(nails, screws, bolts)
Joist & beam hangers
Mass timber & glulam connectors
Mass timber & glulam connectors
Typical Use
Joist-to-hanger, panel-to-panel, general framing connections.
Face-mount, top-flange, skewed, and sloped connections for I-Joists, LVL, and trusses.
Concealed connectors, knife plates, glued-in-rod (GIR) systems.
Panel-to-panel splines, angle brackets, hold-downs.
Key Consideration
Governed by NDS Chapter 12 lateral and withdrawal design values.
Selected per hanger manufacturer's ICC-ES evaluation report and joist reaction loads.
Aesthetics, fire cover requirements, and construction tolerances all factor into selection.
Seismic and wind load transfer between panels.
Types of Connections
and Fasteners
Joist & Beam Hangers
Face-mount, top-flange, skewed, and sloped hanger configurations sized to RedBuilt Red-I™ Joist and RedLam™ LVL reactions.
Glulam & Mass Timber Connectors
Concealed and exposed connector options for beam-to-column and beam-to-girder connections where aesthetics and fire performance both matter.
CLT & Panel Connectors
Panel-to-panel and panel-to-frame hardware for cross-laminated timber floor, wall, and roof assemblies.
General Structural Fasteners
Nails, structural wood screws, and bolts sized and spaced per current NDS provisions for the specific RedBuilt member being connected.
Fire Performance of Connections
A mass timber structure's fire resistance is only as good as its weakest connection. Wood chars at a predictable, engineerable rate — the char layer actually insulates the timber underneath it — but steel connectors and fasteners don't behave the same way. Steel conducts heat quickly into the surrounding wood, which can accelerate charring right at the connection point even when the rest of the member is performing as designed. Fire-resistance ratings can't simply be assumed to carry over from the member to its connections; the connection has to be protected and detailed on its own terms.
The International Building Code (IBC) requires connections in the mass timber construction types (IV-A, IV-B, and IV-C) to achieve a fire-resistance rating equal to the connected members, and the AWC National Design Specification® (NDS) requires connectors, fasteners, and the portions of the wood members that form the connection to be protected for the full required fire-resistance time. There is no single code-prescribed shortcut for this — the design works through AWC's Fire Design Specification (FDS) and its supporting Technical Report 10 (TR10), which address char depth and char contraction at the connection itself.
Two protection strategies, in practice
Concealed connectors
Hardware is fully embedded within the timber cross-section, so the surrounding wood itself provides the fire protection. This is the most common approach where exposed wood is part of the architectural intent, since no visible steel means no separate fire-protection detail to design around.
Sacrificial wood or fire-rated protection
For connections that can't be fully concealed (exposed steel plates, brackets, or ledgers), the exposed hardware is protected with sacrificial timber, Type X gypsum board, or non-combustible insulation sized to the required protection time. Fire-rated plasterboard rated for structural steel can't simply be substituted here at face value — timber connections generally need to be kept to a lower temperature threshold than steel protection assumes, so the protection detail has to be engineered specifically for wood, not borrowed from a steel assembly.
Either way, the tested detail has to be followed as tested — loading, timber cover on all sides, screw pattern, and construction gaps all affect fire performance, and substituting an untested detail in the field can invalidate the rating.
Steel connectors and fasteners used across RedBuilt systems commonly contain recycled content, and corrosion- resistant coatings extend service life and reduce long-term replacement waste.
Where available, RedBuilt passes along applicable recycled-content documentation from the hardware manufacturer to support project LEED® and Green Globes scoring alongside RedBuilt's FSC®- and SFI®-certified wood products.
Technology
Connection design today runs on the same digital workflows as the rest of the structure: BIM-ready connector families for Revit, load calculators for verifying dowel-type fastener capacity against the current NDS, and code-recognized evaluation reports engineers and building officials can cite directly.
From model to fabrication
On a BIM-coordinated project, the connection isn't just drawn — it's modeled as a parametric family carrying real data: fastener count, spacing, and capacity live inside the model, not just on a separate calculation sheet. That matters most once a project moves toward offsite or factory-built delivery, where the same model that shows the connection in Revit is often what drives CNC fabrication of the connected members. A connector detailed once in the model can be checked for clashes with framing, MEP, and adjacent connections before anything is cut, and the cut lists and hole locations can be generated directly from the model's shared parameters rather than re-measured from a drawing.
For mass timber and panelized projects specifically, this connection between the design model and the fabrication floor is what allows tight-tolerance connectors — the concealed, precision-fit types discussed above — to be pre-cut and pre-drilled off-site with confidence that they'll fit in the field. The tighter the connector tolerance, the more the project depends on that model-to-machine link being accurate.
Resources and Downloads
The guides, specs, and data sheets your team needs to specify and install RedBuilt connections and fasteners.
National Presence
RedBuilt engineers and supports complete building systems, engineered wood, mass timber, and the connections that tie them together, from multiple U.S. locations, with technical representatives in your market.
- Manufacturing plants: Chino, CA; Delaware, OH; Hillsboro, OR; Stayton, OR.
- Design centers: Boise, ID; Chino, CA; Delaware, OH; Hillsboro, OR.
- Corporate headquarters: Boise, ID.