Design of Cold-Formed Steel Clip Angles in Compression

The paper presents the experimental results and proposed design method for the compression strength of the cantilevered leg of cold-formed steel clip angle connectors. The variations of the test specimens included the plate aspect ratio, material thickness, and material strength. The test results were compared to three existing standard design methods for cold-formed steel members similar to the clip angles, but no good agreement was found. A new design method was therefore developed to calculate the nominal compression strength of the cantilevered leg of clip angles. The new method was based on the elastic buckling solution of thin-walled plate columns. The allowable-strength design safety factors, load and resistance factor design, and limit-state design resistance factors were also produced to support the proposed design method. (C) 2017 American Society of Civil Engineers.