Rotation Capacity of Bolted Flush End-Plate Stiffened Beam-to-Column Connection

One of the flexibility parameters of semi-rigid joints is rotation capacity. Plastic rotation capacity is especially important in plastic design of framed structures. Current design codes, including Eurocode 3, do not posses procedures enabling designers to obtain value of rotation capacity. In the paper the calculation procedure of the rotation capacity for stiffened bolted flush end-plate beam-to-column connections has been proposed. Theory of experiment design was applied with the use of Hartley’s PS/DS-P:Ha₃ plan. The analysis was performed with the use of finite element method (ANSYS), based on the numerical experiment plan. The determination of maximal rotation angle was carried out with the use of regression analysis. The main variables analyzed in parametric study were: pitch of the bolt “w” (120-180 mm), the distance between the bolt axis and the beam upper edge c_g1 (50-90 mm) and the thickness of the end-plate t_p (10-20 mm). Power function was proposed to describe available rotation capacity of the joint. Influence of the particular components on the rotation capacity was also investigated. In the paper a general procedure for determination of rotation capacity was proposed.