Nonlinear response of bolted end-plate steel connections

The typical configuration used for bolted connections consists of a plate welded to the beam cross section and bolted by two rows to the column flange each in the vicinity of tension and compression beam flanges. Early studies on connections by numerical methods were done by some error. These errors arise from making assumptions including not considering parameters such as the stiffness of end plate, the stiffness of column web, the stiffness of column flange, etc. for simplicity. Also, because of the expensive experimental studies, some limited works have been done on this subject. By developing computer technology, numerical modeling and finite element methods for studying connection behavior have been used by some researchers. In this paper several models of connections were analyzed by ANSYS program to study their geometric and material nonlinear behavior by changing some geometric parameters. Besides these, a model is proposed for such connections to be used in numerical modeling. In order to verify the suggested model, the computer results were compared to available experimental results, which was at acceptable level. Parameters such as plate thickness, bolt diameter, bolt gage distance and the thickness of column flange were investigated in this research. Also moment-curvature curves were drawn and discussed.