• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.897-916
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• 2015

A procedure for critical buckling moment of a tapered beam is proposed with the application of potential energy calculations using Ritz method. Respective solution allows to obtain critical moments initiating lateral buckling of the simply supported, modestly tapered steel I-beams. In particular, lateral-torsional buckling of beams with simultaneously tapered flanges and the web are considered. Detailed, numerical, parametric analyses are carried out. Typical engineering, uniformly distributed design loads are considered for three cases of the load, applied to the top flange, shear centre, as well as to the bottom flange. In addition simply supported beam under gradient moments is investigated. The parametric analysis of simultaneously tapered beam flanges and the web, demonstrates that tapering of flanges influences much more the critical moments than tapering of the web.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.90 no.3
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• pp.273-285
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• 2024

Tapered girders emerged as an economical remedy for the challenges associated with constructing long-span buildings. From an economic standpoint, these systems offer significant advantages, such as wide spans, quick assembly, and convenient access to utilities between the beam's shallow sections and the ceiling below. Elastic-local buckling is among the various failure modes that structural designers must account for during the design process. Despite decades of study, there remains a demand for efficient and comprehensive procedures to streamline product design. One of the most pressing requirements is a better understanding of the tapered web plate girder's local buckling behavior. This paper conducts a comprehensive numerical analysis to estimate the critical buckling coefficient for simply supported tapered steel web plates, considering loading conditions involving compression and bending stresses. An eigenvalue analysis was carried out to determine the natural frequencies and corresponding mode shapes of tapered web plates with varying geometric parameters. Additionally, the study highlights the relative significance of various parameters affecting the local buckling phenomenon, including the tapering ratio of the panel, normalized plate length, and ratio of minimum to maximum compressive stresses. The regression analysis and optimization techniques were performed using MATLAB software for the results of the finite element models to propose a separate formula for each load case and a unified formula covering different compression and bending cases of the elastic local buckling coefficient. The results indicate that the proposed formulas are applicable for estimating the critical buckling coefficient for simply supported tapered steel web plates.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.45-58
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• 2014

EC3 provides several methodologies for the stability verification of members and frames. However, when dealing with the verification of non-uniform members in general, with tapered cross-section, irregular distribution of restraints, non-linear axis, castellated, etc., several difficulties are noted. Because there are yet no guidelines to overcome any of these issues, safety verification is conservative. In recent research from the authors of this paper, an Ayrton-Perry based procedure was proposed for the flexural buckling verification of web-tapered columns. However, in order to apply this procedure, Linear Buckling Analysis (LBA) of the tapered column must be performed for determination of the critical load. Because tapered members should lead to efficient structural solutions, it is therefore of major importance to provide simple and accurate formula for determination of the critical axial force of tapered columns. In this paper, firstly, the fourth order differential equation for non-uniform columns is derived. For the particular case of simply supported web-tapered columns subject to in-plane buckling, the Rayleigh-Ritz method is applied. Finally, and followed by a numerical parametric study, a formula for determination of the critical axial force of simply supported linearly web-tapered columns buckling in plane is proposed leading to differences up to 8% relatively to the LBA model.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.225-238
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• 2012

Steel structural elements with web-tapered I cross section, are usually made of welded thin plates. Due to the nonrectangular shape of the element, thin web section may be obtained at the maximum cross section height. The buckling strength is directly influenced by lateral restraining, end support and initial imperfections. If no lateral restraints, or when they are not effective enough, the global behaviour of the members is characterized by the lateral torsional mode and interaction with sectional buckling modes may occur. Actual design codes do not provide a practical design approach for this kind of elements. The paper summarizes an experimental study performed by the authors on a relevant number of elements of this type. The purpose of the work was to evaluate the actual behaviour of the web tapered beam-columns when applying different types of lateral restraints and different web thickness.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Hazard Mitigation
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.45-49
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• 2008

This paper investigated the accuracy of the current design formulae for the elastic buckling strength of web-tapered I-beams in AISC-LRFD specification. The basic concept is to replace a tapered beam by an equivalent prismatic beam with a different length, but with a cross section identical to that of the smaller end of the tapered beam. The modification factor, B, is used to account for the stress gradient within the unbraced length and the lateral restraining effects offered by the adjacent segments. The modification factor(B) suggested in AISC-LRFD specification was compared with the finite element method(FEM) results. This paper presented a redefined method to calculate the modification factor(B).

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.10 no.5
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• pp.479-489
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• 2000

Based on the stiffness equation of the tapered beam element involving the effects of axial force and shear deformation, numerical investigations are carried out on elastic instability for web-linearly tapered columns with I-section of steel portal frames. Effects of shear deformation on the effective length of the tapered columns with I-section are studied. An efficient approach for determining the effective length of the tapered portal frame columns considering effects of shear deformation is proposed.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.493-501
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• 2007

Recently, in the domestic amount of materials,curtailment and economic efficiency security by purpose, tapered beam application is achieved, but the architectural design technology of today based on the material non-linear method does not consider solutions to problems such as brittle fracture. So, geometric non-linear evaluation thatincludes initial deformation, width-thickness ratio, web stiffener and unbraced length is required. Therefore, in this study, we used ANSYS, a proven finite elementanalysis program,and material and geometric non-linear analysis to study existing and completed tapered H-section as deep beam's analysis model. Main parameters include the width-thickness ratio of web, stiffener, and flange brace, with the experimental result obtained by main variable buckling and limit strength evaluation. We made certain that a large width-thickness ratio of the web decreases the buckling strength and short unbraced web significantly improves ductility.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.321-329
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• 2006

The use of tapered structural members was first proposed by Ami rikian for the economical use of materials.Generaly, tapered members are used in single-story structures with one or more bays and in cantilevered sections of ate architectural representation. If only focused on the section performance, however, the width-to-thickness ratio or t apered ratio can exced regulations. Such a case requires a study on the behavior of tapered members. To investigate the plastic and local buckling behavior of web-tapered beams, seven steel beams were the tapered ratio and the width-to-thicknes ratio. The results of maximum strength, strength deterioration, and stiffnes deterioration were compared.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.281-301
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• 2004

The paper begins by presenting a unified variational approach to the lateral-torsional buckling (LTB) analysis of doubly symmetric prismatic and tapered thin-walled beams with open cross-sections, which accounts for the influence of the pre-buckling deflections. This approach (i) extends the kinematical assumptions usually adopted for prismatic beams, (ii) consistently uses shell membrane theory in general coordinates and (iii) adopts Trefftz's criterion to perform the bifurcation analysis. The proposed formulation is then applied to investigate the influence of the pre-buckling deflections on the LTB behaviour of prismatic and web-tapered I-section simply supported beams and cantilevers. After establishing an interesting analytical result, valid for prismatic members with shear centre loading, several elastic critical moments/loads are presented, discussed and, when possible, also compared with values reported in the literature. These numerical results, which are obtained by means of the Rayleigh-Ritz method, (i) highlight the qualitative differences existing between the LTB behaviours of simply supported beams and cantilevers and (ii) illustrate how the influence of the pre-buckling deflections on LTB is affected by a number of factors, namely ($ii_1$) the minor-to-major inertia ratio, ($ii_2$) the beam length, ($ii_3$) the location of the load point of application and ($ii_4$) the bending moment diagram shape.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.389-402
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• 2008

In December 2005, one(A) of the two pre-engineered warehouse buildings in the port of K City of Korea was completely destroyed and the other(B) was seriously damaged to be demolished. Over-loaded snow and unexpected blast of wind were the causes of the accident and destructive behavior was brittle fracture caused by web local buckling and lateral torsional buckling at the flange below rafter. However, the architectural design technology of today based on material non-linear method does not consider the tolerances to solve the problem of such brittle fracture. So, geometric non-linear evaluation which includes initial deformation, width-thickness ratio, web stiffener and unbraced length is required. This study evaluates the structural safety of 4 models in terms of width-thickness ratio and unbraced length using ANSYS 9.0 with parameters such as width-thickness ratio of web, existence/non-existence of stiffener and unbraced length. The purpose of this study is to analyze destructive mechanism of the above-mentioned two warehouse buildings and to provide ways to promote the safety of pre-engineered buildings.