A sensitivity study on number of elements in refined plastic-hinge analysis

Abstract

Since the power of personal computers and engineering workstations is rapidly increasing, it is now feasible to employ advanced analysis techniques for direct design office use. One of the desirable attributes of practical advanced analysis methods is that one or two elements for a member can be used to model accurately for both material and geometric nonlinearities for computational efficiency. To this end, the concept of the refined plastic-hinge analysis as a practical advanced analysis is reviewed, and a sensitivity study using the analysis is performed on the required number of elements for a beam member subjected to distributed transverse loads. It is found that a two-element model is adequate to predict strength accurately. To model parabolic out-of-straightness of a beam–column, two elements with a maximum initial deflection at the mid-height of a member are found adequate for capturing the imperfection effects. It is concluded that the refined plastic-hinge analysis is efficient in computation.