Ultimate Strength and Deformation of Steel Tubular Members Subjected to Impulsive Lateral Loads.

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the ultimate strength and deformation of steel tubular members subjected to impulsive lateral loads. Simple and explicit formulas for estimation of ultimate strength and deformation are proposed. Dynamical experiments on steel circular tubes have been carried out, and design formulas are derived from the experimental results. When the geometries of the circular tubes and the material parameters are given, ultimate strength, deformation and absorbed energy are easily estimated using the proposed design formulas. Moreover, numerical analyses for the circular tubes are performed using FEM. The numerical solutions for deformations and collapse load are compared with the experimental results. From the results of the dynamical experiments and numerical analyses, the accuracy and applicable range of the proposed estimation formulas are discussed.