Experimental study on the behaviour and load carrying capacity of thin-walled reinforced concrete compression members - channel section with vertical stiffeners

Abstract

The conventional pre-cast RC wall panels are heavy and pose problems during handling and erection. The above problems can be avoided, if thin-walled RC wall panels are used. But thin-walled RC wall panels made of open sections undergo torsional flexural buckling, when subjected to axial loads. To reduce this adverse effect an attempt has been made in channel sections by introducing a vertical stiffener in the web portion. The behaviour and load carrying capacity were studied through testing sixteen numbers of specimens. The slenderness ratio and width to breadth ratio of the specimens are identified as more influencing parameters in load carrying capacity and mode of failure of the specimens for a given percentage of area of steel. The effect of these parameters on the strength and behaviour are presented and discussed. All the popular existing equations to predict the failure load of RC walls are compared with the experimental failure load. It is observed that the ACI 318-1977 part(4) equation predicts the failure load more closely than other equations over a narrow range of slenderness ratio, hence a suitable modified equation is suggested based on reduction in load capacity and strength degradation per unit increase in slenderness ratio.