Axial compression behavior of Q690E/Q960E high-strength steel tubes at low temperatures

This study reported the axial compression behavior of square Q690E/Q960E high-strength steel (HSS) tubes in cold regions. Sixteen HSS tubes with various wall thicknesses were tested at - 80- 20 C. Most of the tested HSS tubes failed in elastic local buckling. Low temperatures exhibited limited improvements (less than 8%) on their compressive resistances (Pu). Finite-element (FE) models considering low-temperature material properties were developed and used for further parametric studies. The FE parametric studies examined the influence of low temperatures and cross-sectional slenderness. Finally, this paper also checked the validity of different code equations on predicting Pu of HSS tubes at low temperatures.