Ultimate load behaviour of steel beams with web openings.

A detailed study on the ultimate load behaviour of steel beams with openings in the web is presented in the paper. Hot rolled steel beams ISMB 100 with openings in the web were tested to failure. The beams were simply supported at the ends and subjected to a concentrated load at the mid span. The behaviour of such special type of beams was closely studied in order to obtain a complete picture of the failure, to get the optimumspacing to diameter ratio for openings. All the beams were examined by the elasto–plastic finite-element method by using general finite-element analysis software ANSYS and the results were compared with those obtained experimentally. The test results indicate that the load-carrying capacity decreases with the increase in the openings area as well as positions of openings. The finite-element results show good agreement with that of the experiments. From the parametric study, it is observed that best location for web opening is middle 2/3 of the span. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]