• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
• /
• v.22 no.5
• /
• pp.465-475
• /
• 2010

In the horizontally curved bridges, girders are subjected to the combined action of vertical bending and torsion due to their curvatures without any eccentric loads. As subjected to bending and torsion, the ultimate strength of steel/concrete composite box girders are limited by the diagonal tensile stress in the deck concrete induced by the St. Venant torsion. To determine the ultimate strength of composite box girders in bending and torsion and their interactions, this study conducted a 3-dimensional FEA and classical strength of materials investigation. Using ABAQUS, the FEA fully utilized advanced nonlinear analysis techniques simulating material/geometrical nonlinearity and post-cracking behaviors. The ultimate strength from numerical data were compared with theoretically derived values. Concurrent compressive stresses in the concrete deck improve the shear-resisting capacity of concrete, thereby resulting in an increased torsional resistance of the composite box girder in positive bending. The proposed interaction equation is very simple yet it provides a rational lower bound in determining the ultimate strength of concrete/steel composite box girders.