PROPERTIES OF COLD-FORMED STEEL SECTIONS

There is great flexibility in the design using cold-formed steel. The low cost, ease of manufacture and controlled quality can encourage the development of innovative uses. In spite of the advantages, the range of application is limited in Latvia, especially for load bearing structures. The resistance of thin-walled cold-formed steel sections should be determined according to EN 1993-1-3 (2006) and 1993-1-5 (2006) by the effective width method. As a first step, in this paper the resistance to local buckling of cold-formed sections in compression and bending is analysed taking into account geometrical proportions, influence of rounded corners and stiffeners. By numerical analysis there is given the estimation of effective U and C-section properties in the range of width-to-thickness (b/t) and width-to-height (b/h) in concordance with EN 1993-1-3, Section 5. In addition to the numerical analysis there are presented and assessed results of experimental research with natural beams in bending.