ABSTRACT
Along with the development of large-span-weight spatial structures, stiffened joints are more and more applied to actual projects. The study on hollow structural sections is always including unstiffened joints and stiffened joints. The externally reinforced joints (Packer et al. 1997) are often applied, because of more difficult weld inside small size hollow sections than large ones. There is much study on ringstiffened tubular joints in offshore structures (Myers et al. 2001, Rama Raju et al. 1995, Lee et al. 1999), and ring-stiffened joints were applied to some projects in China (Zhang et al. 2004).
