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Abstract

This thesis examines the influence of moment-resisting supports on the behaviour of concrete-steel composite perforated beams using custom pre- and post-processing software through a parametric FE investigation.

The use of moment-resisting supports is beneficial in decreasing the maximum midspan deflection and the bending moment carried by a beam. Currently, design guidance for composite perforated beams focuses on simple supports, leaving open the potential benefits of using fixed or partially-fixed supports for further investigation. For the investigation, due the number of parameters it encompasses, several software packages were developed. This software allowed extensive automation of the work-flow from the mesh generation to the data processing by minimising the required user input. Additionally, the pre-processor allows the customisation of the FE model beyond the capabilities available to the user via the FE program interface, while the post-processor enables a detailed investigation of the FE results. The software capabilities were validated against physical experiments available from the literature for non composite and composite cases. Following this, a series of parameters were examined in order to establish the influence of each on the beam capacity for various support conditions. In addition, transitional behavioural values for each of the investigated parameters are established, identifying when a failure mode change occurs for each support type. Finally, the FE results were processed further and compared directly against available literature by extracting the nodal forces and moments for each of the beams to establish the internal force distribution. This allowed the investigation of various failure modes in greater detail and bypassed the simplifying behavioural assumptions required when calculating the internal forces for these structural systems. It was shown that these algorithms can be used as a basis to extend the guidance to cover moment-resisting design and examine the various failure modes in greater detail.

Publication Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Subjects:	T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
Departments:	Doctoral Theses School of Science & Technology > School of Science & Technology Doctoral Theses School of Science & Technology > Engineering

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