Seismic Analysis Model of Partially Concrete-Filled Steel Piers Considering Ultralow-Cycle Fatigue Crack Propagation

ABSTRACT

Seismic performance of partially concrete-filled steel tube (PCFST) bridge piers is controlled by the coupled failure of ultralow-cycle fatigue (ULCF) and local instability of steel plates. An empirical formula was established for the plastic fracture displacement on average stress triaxiality of the crack intiation process, and the two-stage prediction model for the ULCF cracking of steel was improved. Furthermore, an empirical formula was established for the plastic strain amplification factor on the element size and the stress triaxiality of the coarse model. A complete modeling method was proposed for the seismic performance analysis model of PCFST piers considering ULCF cracking.

KEYWORDS:

• Bridge engineering
• partially concrete-filled steel tube bridge piers
• local instability
• ultralow-cycle fatigue cracking
• crack propagation process

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to express their gratitude to Dassault Systèmes Simulia Corporation for allowing the use of their powerful commercial FE package-ABAQUS6.14 during this research.

Author Contributions

Hanqing Zhuge: Conceptualization; Formal analysis; Funding acquisition; Roles/Writing – original draft; Writing – review & editing.

Rui Du: Software; Validation; Investigation

Shuailing Li: Methodology; Data curation.

Zhanzhan Tang: Project administration; Supervision.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data Availability Statement

All data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the General Program of the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 51878606] and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation [grant number 2023M730154].