ABSTRACT
Although the strength of welded tubular connections involves several failure modes, current design codes are mainly based on statistical analyses of experimental data on simple configurations. Especially for multiplanar joints, which behave much more complex than the corresponding uniplanar joints, it is essential to base the strength on appropriate models which can be used in general for uniplanar and multiplanar joints. For this reason, a further analysis of the basic behaviour of uniplanar T-joints is made.
For uniplanar T-joints, failure is caused by local joint failure or by failure due to overall chord bending and shear. The most governing parameter (chord length), however, is not included explicitly in the current design codes. In a previous study (van der Vegte 1994), finite element analyses have been performed on uniplanar T-joints in which the effects of overall chord bending were excluded in order to separate the influences due to local failure and overall chord bending failure. In the present paper, the results are presented of finite element analyses on uniplanar tubular T-joints which include the influences of overall chord bending. Combining the results of the previous and the present research provides the interaction contour between local joint strength and strength due to overall chord bending.
The described strategy to separate local failure from overall chord bending failure makes the behaviour of uniplanar T-joints very clear and will be extended to other types of joints.
