Shear behaviour and design of bolted steel girders with trapezoidal corrugated webs

A novel type of bolted steel girders with trapezoidal corrugated webs (BSG-TCW) was introduced in this paper, and the shear behaviour of such girders was thoroughly investigated by experimental study, numerical simulation, and analytical analysis. A total of six bolted steel girders with trapezoidal corrugated webs were designed and fabricated, and were tested subject to three-point bending afterwards. It was revealed that all the girder specimens experienced shear buckling failure. The obtained experimental results, including the ultimate shear resistances, the shear strain distribution characteristics of the web, and the critical local buckling loads of BSG-TCW were reported and discussed herein. Elaborate finite element (FE) models capable of accurately simulating the shear behaviour of BSG-TCW were developed by ABAQUS, and were further validated against the experimental results. Upon validation of the numerical models, the influences of key parameters including the web depth, web panel thickness, corrugation profile were separately evaluated, and different boundary conditions of web panels corresponding to either bolting or welding were analysed in detail. Moreover, based on the summarised test data and the 76 generated FE results, the accuracy and applicability of existing calculation methods for the shear resistance of welded steel girders with trapezoidal corrugated webs were assessed, and newly modified formulae taking into account the shear contribution of the T-flanges were proposed for predicting the elastic shear buckling strength and the shear resistance of BSG-TCW. •A novel type of bolted steel girders with trapezoidal corrugated webs is presented.•Shear tests were performed on six girder specimens fabricated by high strength bolts.•Critical local buckling and ultimate shear performance of girder specimens were obtained.•FE models of girders were validated against shear tests and parametric studies were conducted.•Newly revised design formulae for critical shear buckling stress and shear resistance were proposed.