This European Standard specifies the test methods for determining the strength capacity and stiffness of joints made with punched metal plate fasteners in load bearing timber structures, being used to join two or more pieces of timber of the same thickness in the same plane. The properties measured are:- load-slip characteristics and maximum load resulting from the lateral resistance of the embedded projections, at various angles between the direction of the applied force and; - the axis of the fastener (load-fastener angle ); - the direction of the grain of the timber (load-grain angle ); - the tension capacity of the fastener at various angles; - the compression capacity of the fastener at various angles; - the shear capacity of the fastener at various angles. A nail root test method is shown in Annex A.