Shear Buckling of Thin-Walled Channel Section with Intermediate Web Stifffener (No. R892)

Abstract

The elastic buckling stress of the web of a thin-walled section member in shear is generally improved by the presence of flange and lips. However, for webs with relatively large depth-to-thickness ratios, the local buckling mode in shear occurs mainly in the web. The structural efficiency of such webs can be improved by adding an intermediate stiffener cold-formed longitudinally in the middle of the web. In this report, the computational modelling of thin-walled steel sections is implemented by means of a spline finite strip analysis to determine the elastic buckling stresses of channel sections subject to pure shear. Lipped channels with an intermediate web stiffener are studied where the main variables are the dimensions of the stiffener in both depth and width directions. Results and comparisons of analyses are included in this reports.