Performance of double skin-profiled composite shear walls - experiments and design equations

The novel form of composite walling system consists of two skins of profiled steel sheeting with an infill of concrete. The knowledge of the behaviour of such walling under shear loading is important to use this system as shear elements in a steel framed building. Currently design provisions for this novel form of framed shear walling do not exist. This paper presents the results of tests on one-sixth scale models of the composite wall and its components, manufactured from very thin sheeting and microconcrete. The heavily instrumented small-scale tests provided information on the load-deflection response, strength, stiffness, strain condition, sheet-concrete interaction, and failure modes. Analytical models for the shear strength and stiffness of the wall are derived. The adequacy of design equations is validated through experimental results and finite element modelling.