Trade Journals for the Concrete Industry

In this work, a connection between precast concrete beam and concrete-filled steel tubular column is proposed. The main purpose is to transfer bending moments and shear forces from the beam to the composite column, mobilizing the concrete core. In a first stage, a connection composed only by column and corbel was tested aiming to evaluate the viability of the manufacture process and the efficiency of the connection for shear transfer. It was observed that the transfer of shear to the steel tube was guaranteed. The corbel behaved in a predictable way and supported high loads, despite having been made with thin steel plates. A visible deformation of the internal stiffener occurred even for small displacements, indicating the beginning of the failure process. The use of shear connectors in the steel tube increased the load capacity and improved the performance of the connection. In the second stage of this study, the connection was tested with all structural elements (column, beam, slab and corbel) to evaluate the efficiency to transfer bending moments and shear forces. The observed behaviour was very effective to transfer negative bending moments and just acceptable for positive ones.