Study of the load bearing capacity of light gauge steel shear wall panels under static and dynamic load

Light gauge steel shear wall systems play very important roles in light gauge steel construction. They have been widely used in residential and industrial buildings. This thesis presents an investigation of the mechanical characteristics of light gauge steel shear wall panels subjected to static and dynamic in-plane shear loads. The thesis briefly introduces the development of light gauge steel wall panel construction and clarifies the differences and merits of the three most frequently employed wall panel systems namely the framed wall panel, the cassette wall panel and the sandwich wall panel. The literature research carried out in this thesis concentrates on recent publications describing research into light gauge steel wall construction, which covered the failure modes of shear wall panels, the mechanical performance and innovation of connectors and whole shear wall panel systems. In particularly, a number of publications on the hysteretic behaviour of connectors and lightweight shear wall systems under dynamic loads have been reviewed in order to understand the dynamic behaviour of lightweight shear wall systems. The investigation of the LINDAB cold-formed steel stud wall panels described in this thesis included full-sized model tests and FE numerical simulation analyses. The full-sized model tests were carried out in the Politehnica University of Timisoara, Romania, and investigated the mechanical performances of stud wall panels with or without door openings under monotonic and cyclic shear loads applied at the top of wall. The FE numerical simulation analyses investigated the mechanical behaviour of stud wall panels with or without door openings and with different sheet materials, connection modes and boundary conditions etc. The analyses and comparisons of the experimental and numerical results obtained from the investigations showed that the connections and material properties of sheets governed the whole load bearing capacity and mechanical characteristics of light gauge steel stud wall panels under in-plane shear loads and that the equivalent shear modulus of sheet materials can be evaluated by the method proposed in the Manual of Stressed Skin Diaphragm Design [Davies J.M. and Bryan E.R. (1982)]. Based on the experimental and numerical results, a non-linear mathematical model for the in-plane shear load-deflection relationship of the LINDAB wall panel is proposed. The investigation of CIBBAP steel cassette wall panels given in this thesis is based on FE numerical simulation analyses by using non-linear FE programs ABAQUS 6.2(2001) and DRAIN-3D (1994). The investigation was divided into two parts: the wall panel under in-plane static shear loads and the wall panel subjected to seismic loads. (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.).