Comparison of shear lag in structural steel building with framed tube and braced tube

Abstract

Under lateral loads Framed Tube (FT) system exhibits reduction of cantilever efficiency due to the effect of shear lag. Braced Tube (BT) represents a valuable solution to overcome shear lag problems by stiffening the exterior frame with diagonal braced members. This study investigates the effect of shear lag on BT and FT under wind load. Shear lag and top-level displacement results are compared with previous findings by researchers on FT and BT systems. The investigation of the effect of various configurations in BT on the reduction the shear lag is another objective of this study. The efficiency of each structure is evaluated using the linear response spectrum analysis to obtain shear lag. STADD Pro software is used to run the dynamic analysis of the models. Results show there is relatively less shear lag in all the BT configurations compared to the FT structural system. Moreover, the comparison of the obtained result with those derived by previous studies shows that shear lag is not proportional to lateral displacement. With respect to results, optimum BT configuration in term of lower shear lag caused by lateral loads is presented.