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Quasi-static and Impact Behaviour of Innovative Hybrid Corrugated (HC) Members
thesis
posted on 2017-04-19, 02:45authored byMohammad Nassirnia
In today’s world,
organised research and development have greatly increased the production of new
knowledge. Over the past few decades, innovations and the outcome of innovative
activities have surrounded us; some affect our life more than others while some
are more noticeable than others. Indeed, technology evolution gradually forms
our modern life. On this journey, structural engineers are not an exemption
though. They have always been trying to find more resilient structural members
in order to build high performance infrastructure. As an attempt to achieve
this goal, innovative Hybrid Corrugated (HC) sections are introduced and
examined in this thesis.
The HC sections exhibit superior behaviour in comparison to
conventional tubular sections, not only on the performance of structures, but
also from an aesthetic point of view. The square shape of these hollow sections
are comprised of four corrugated plates which may or may not have corner tubes
welded to the apexes of the section. The material of plates is from medium
strength structural steel whilst it is ultra-high strength steel for the corner
tubes.
The major objective of this research work is to investigate
the behaviour of HC members under quasi-static and impact loadings. For the
former loading case, the full-scale HC sections are loaded under axial
compression and four-point bending. The latter loading case is addressed through
a falling mass dropped on the mid-span of the HC member.
Getting validated by the experimental data, this research
also focuses on the development of predictive numerical models for further
understanding the mechanical behaviour, section capacities and energy
absorption of HC sections. The developed model is used to predict the
performance of HC sections with various geometrical parameters. After
parametric studies on the HC sections with different corrugation profiles, an
explicit formulation is analytically developed to estimate the compressive load
carrying and flexural moment capacities of HC sections.
The results of this research will help engineers to compare
the superior performance of HC sections with equivalent fabricated sections and
tailor HC sections according to their needs and reach to an optimised
configuration. The derived analytical formulation has the potential to be used
in the codes of practice for rational analysis and design of HC sections.