A comparative study of continuous steel–concrete composite beams prestressed with external tendons: Experimental investigation

Abstract

A comparative study of prestressed continuous steel–concrete composite beams is carried out based on an experimental investigation. Four full-scale continuous composite beams were tested, among which two were two-span beams and two were three-span beams. One of the two-span beams was a conventional non-prestressed composite beam, and the other was a composite beam prestressed with external tendons in both the positive and negative moment regions. One of the three-span composite beams was non-prestressed, and the other was prestressed only in the negative moment regions with external high-strength tendons. The cracking behaviors, distortional lateral and local buckling as well as the load carrying capacity of the beams were investigated experimentally. Full plasticity was developed at the mid-span section of each beam; however, the maximum moments attained at the internal supports were governed by local buckling, which is related to the slenderness of the composite section. It is found that in hogging moment regions, the ultimate moment resistance of a composite beam prestressed with external tendons is governed by either distortional lateral buckling or local buckling, or an interactive mode composed of distortional lateral and local buckling. The results show that exerting prestressing on a continuous composite beam with external tendons increases the degree of the internal force and moment redistribution in the beam. A design proposal based on moment redistribution to evaluate the load carrying capacity of continuous composite beams with external tendons is proposed.