Experimental study on bearing capacity of corroded Q345 H-shaped steel column under axial compression load

In order to investigate the effect of corrosion damage on the bearing performance of H-shaped steel columns under axial compression, experimental study was carried out on specimens obtained from artificial accelerated corrosion. Firstly, the cleaned corroded surface morphologies were scanned by a 3D laser profiler. The volume loss ratio, residual cross-sectional area, centroid coordinate, and other parameters of the corroded specimens were calculated and analyzed, and the material properties of the corroded steel were obtained. Then, an uncorroded steel column and four corroded steel columns were subjected to the axial compression test, and it was found that corrosion damage significantly reduced the axial compression bearing capacity of the steel column and the degree of bearing capacity degradation was negatively correlated with its volume loss ratio. In addition, the failure mode of the axially compressed steel column changed from the overall buckling of the uncorroded specimen to the local-overall interactive buckling because of corrosion. Moreover, the final failure location was in the height range with the most serious volume loss of the corroded specimen. Finally, based on the directly scanned corroded morphology, an innovative modeling method using shell elements was proposed and verified.