A Numerical Study on Inplane Nonlinear Buckling Strengths of New Arches Subjected to Uniformly Distributed Loading

This paper investigates the characteristics of buckling loads for steel arches with new type cross section which is consisted of T-section and pipe-section. A general purpose finite-element program ABAQUS was used to evaluate the inelastic buckling strengths of the arches which included the influence of the geometric and material nonlinearity. According to the comparisons between earlier studies and results from finite-element analyses, new design equations should be developed for the new arches. New buckling factors were developed to consider influence of rise-to-span ratio and boundary conditions. It is found that the presented factors are sufficiently accurate to predict the inplane buckling loads of new type section steel arches subjected to uniformly distributed loading. The proposed equations can be used to investigate new type steel arches subjected to unsymmetrical loading and composited arches.