Composite Beams with Nonlinear Material and Connector Behaviour for Low Degrees of Partial Shear Connection

This paper describes a study on the minimum degree of partial shear connection for steel-to-concrete composite beams taking into account the non-linear load-slip behaviour of the shear connectors and further parameters. The minimum degree of shear connection for a large number of cases is determined based on the results from comprehensive nonlinear numerical simulations. The numerical model used is able to describe the post-ultimate limit state behaviour and thus allows for investigating the ductility of a composite beam. Based on the studies shown below the design rules given in Eurocode 4 for composite beams with partial shear connection (based on a characteristic slip of δuk = 6 mm) can be extended to characteristic slip values from 1 mm to 15 mm. While the values for the minimum degree of partial shear connection given in Eurocode 4 were confirmed for composite beams with two single loads, some differences were found for composite beams exposed to uniform load.