Abstract
In this study, experiments were conducted on five specimens of stiffened and unstiffened steel plate shear walls under cyclic loading. First, the specimens and frame design, material properties, and test setup were described. The behaviors of the unstiffened aluminum and steel infill plates were compared with three configurations of stiffened steel plate, i.e., cross-stiffened, circular-stiffened, and diagonally stiffened. The cross-sectional areas of the stiffeners were the same for all stiffened specimens. The results showed that the aluminum infill plate exhibited less ductility. By contrast, the unstiffened steel plate was very ductile, exhibiting a stable hysteresis curve and no tearing. The energy-absorption capacity of the steel plate shear walls increased for all stiffening configurations. Among all configurations, the cross-shaped stiffeners showed considerable increase in shear stiffness, ductility, and energy-dissipation capacity. The plate frame interaction method could predict the ultimate shear strengths of the unstiffened and cross-stiffened panels with good precision. The circular-stiffened steel shear wall seems to behave more desirably in high-amplitude displacements.
Highlights
Owing to the excellent seismic performance of steel plate shear walls, they are considered a desirable choice for lateral load resisting systems
Owing to the wide approval for steel shear walls, the focus of researchers on behavior characterization are shifting toward new aspects of steel plate shear walls (SPSWs) [6,7,8,9,10,11,12]
Owing to extensive shear yielding in SPSWs, the pure shear mechanism leads to a stable plastic cyclic behavior
Summary
Owing to the excellent seismic performance of steel plate shear walls, they are considered a desirable choice for lateral load resisting systems. Steel shear walls possess the advantages of both moment-resisting frames (ductility) and braced frames (high initial stiffness) [1, 2]. The lateral shear forces on steel shear walls can be resisted by two mechanisms, i.e., pure shear and diagonal tension field. Owing to extensive shear yielding in SPSWs, the pure shear mechanism leads to a stable plastic cyclic behavior. In this case, pinching effects (Sshaped hysteresis loops) do not appear in the hysteresis curves. The pure shear mechanism is expected in a thick infill plate; this mechanism is uneconomical because it requires strong boundary members in SPSWs
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