Non-conservative Instability of Shear Flexible Steel Columns Considering Inelastic Effect

The aim of this paper was to investigate the non-conservative instability behavior of the shear flexible steel columns considering the inelastic effect. The tangent modulus and the effective length factor are newly evaluated using the iterative approach based on the AISC-LRFD and CRC strength curves. The equation of motion of shear flexible inelastic column is derived from the extended Hamilton’s principle. The finite element procedure using the Hermite cubic interpolation functions taking into account the shear effect is employed to obtain the mass, inelastic stiffness, geometric stiffness, and load correction matrices. The evaluation procedure for the critical values of divergence and flutter loads are briefly described, and the obtained results are compared with available results through numerical examples. In particular, the effects of various structural parameters such as the material inelasticity, the shear deformation, the rotary inertia, the effective length factor, and the non-conservativeness factor on the non-conservative instability behavior of steel columns are parametrically investigated.