Scaled Analysis of Steel-Concrete Composite Beam-Column Connections

Today, mature beam-column connections exist for composite structures and their structural behaviour has been studied in many tests. Yet, it is still problematic to perform a detailed analysis even with the help of finite elements, let alone to include their results in the analysis of a complete frame. This keynote lecture first reviews current modelling approaches for typical composite beam-column connections under static and cyclic (e.g. earthquake) loading and their problems and limitations. It then presents a scaling concept that combines sophisticated local models with a broader frame analysis using a macro-element approach. The local models may be provided by and maintained at different institutions that broadcast their results on demand to a user performing a frame analysis. Thus, up-to-date state-of-the-art knowledge on local behaviour can be included in a design environment without prohibitive modelling effort. D