EWM-based design method for distortional buckling of cold-formed thin-walled lipped channel sections with holes

The distortional buckling is easy to occur for the cold-formed steel (CFS) lipped channel sections with holes. There is no design provision about effective width method (EWM) to predict the distortional buckling strength of CFS lipped channel sections with holes in China. His aim of this paper is to present an proposal of effective width method for the distortional buckling strength of CFS lipped channel sections with holes based on theoretical and numerical analysis on the partially stiffened element and CFS lipped channel section with holes. Firstly, the prediction methods for the distortional buckling stress and distortional buckling coefficients of CFS lipped channel sections with holes were developed based on the energy method and simplified rotation restrained stiffness. The accuracy of the proposed method for distortional buckling stress was verified by using the finite element method. Then the modified EWM was proposed to calculate the distortional buckling strength and the capacity of the interaction buckling of CFS lipped channel sections with holes based on the proposal of distortional buckling coefficient. Finally, comparisons on ultimate capacities of CFS lipped channel sections with holes of the calculated results by using the modified effective width method with 347 experimental results and 1598 numerical results indicated that the proposed EWM is reasonable and has a high accuracy and reliability for predicting the ultimate capacities of CFS lipped channel section with holes. Meanwhile, the predictions by the North America specification are slightly unconservative.