ABSTRACT
For the numerical structural design of welded plate girders, residual stresses and initial deformations need to be taken into account. Typically, this is done by prescribing initial deformations and some sort of simplified residual stress pattern manually to the numerical model. These assumptions are often quite conservative and particularly in the case of residual stresses there is still a major lack of knowledge. On the other hand, nowadays, the numerical welding simulation methods have improved significantly and contribute to describe, e.g., residual stresses due to welding more realistically. However, these techniques are yet almost impossible to implement into capacity models due to the large computation efforts required to perform such analysis even on smallest building components. In this context, the paper presents a simplified numerical approach based on a modified, so-called local-global model approach. This approach was developed as part of a national project on residual stresses and subsequently further detailed and automated to improve its practical applicability. The basic steps and developed calculation tools are described herein based on a simple example of a welded I-girder.
