Simplified Approaches to Design Medium-Rise Unbraced Steel Storage Pallet Racks. I: Elastic Buckling Analysis

Abstract

AbstractThe design of steel storage pallet racks is quite complex, despite the fact that these structures are built with economical components and manufactured from thin coils or sheets. The most advanced approaches for rack design recommend the use of simplified methods to estimate the key parameters governing both static and seismic design. In the first case, which is the core of this first part of a two-part paper, an evaluation of the elastic critical load multiplier for the sway buckling mode (αcr) is required to select the method of analysis and check member instability. The term αcr can be predicted through simplified approaches, which have been adequately calibrated for traditional steel structures constructed with members having a double-symmetric cross section. Rack uprights (columns) have, in general, an open cross section, with one axis of symmetry, and thus the overall frame response and member behavior is significantly influenced by Wagner’s coefficients, warping torsion, and shear-center ec...