Experimental study into the behaviour of profiled composite walls under combined axial and thermal loadings

• Published in: Engineering structures 2020-05, Vol.210, p.110354, Article 110354
• Main Authors: Le, Quang X., Dao, Vinh T.N., Torero, José L., Ngo, Tuan D.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Ambient temperature; Axial load capacity; Axial loads; Boundary conditions; Bowing; Damage tolerance; Ductile-brittle transition; Ductility; Failure modes; Failure plane; Heat flux; Heat resistance; High temperature; Profiled composite wall; Reinforced concrete; Shear strength; Side heating; Temperature; Temperature effects; Temperature gradient; Temperature gradients; Walls
• ISSN: 0141-0296; 1873-7323
• DOI: 10.1016/j.engstruct.2020.110354

•Highlight the importance of research into PCWs’ performance at high temperature.•Establish a reliable thermal-structural boundary condition using for PCWs’ tests.•Understand failure modes of PCWs at ambient and elevated temperatures.•Examine the effects of the gap between the steel sheet and the core during heating.•Quantify the effects of combined axial and thermal loadings on PCWs. Profiled composite walls (PCWs) are regularly used in construction because they provide enhanced ductility, shear resistance and damage tolerance when compared to traditional reinforced concrete walls. Although much research has been conducted to understand the structural performance of PCWs at ambient temperature, studies into their performance at high temperatures remain limited. In this work, a comprehensive set of experiments has been conducted to investigate the performance of PCWs at both ambient and elevated temperatures. A heat source comprising of radiant burners and 1MN MTS machine were employed to deliver known and actively controlled thermal and structural boundary conditions on the PCW samples. The experiments were conducted to understand the effects of an incident heat flux when combined with loads. The results from this study have shown that (i) the axial load capacity of PCWs decreases as the temperature increases; (ii) the PCWs tends to exhibit ductile failure modes when cold but brittle failure at high temperature; (iii) due to thermal bowing, the failure plane of the PCWs subjected to one-side heating shifts closer to the heating source; and (iv) applying a load in an eccentric manner can compensate for the effect of temperature gradient.