NUMERICAL ANALYSIS STUDY ON LATERAL BRACING WITH LOAD-CARRYING CAPACITY FOR WIDE FLANGE BEAMS SUBJECTED TO CYCLIC LOADING

This paper presents a numerical study on the effect of lateral bracing with load-carrying capacity for beams subjected to cyclic loading, and proposes a new lateral bracing arrangement method. The current Japanese standard adopts two lateral bracing methods with load-carrying capacity. One is the method to locate lateral bracings equally, the other is to locate lateral bracings near the plastic hinge first and brace the remainder of the beam according to allowable stress requirements. In the proposed method, lateral bracings are located at the position with beam-ends and the remainder as equal distance of lb/iy≤100.