Sway buckling of down-aisle, spliced, unbraced pallet rack structures

This paper presents an efficient approach to the determination of the buckling loads of downaisle, spliced, unbraced, pallet rack structures subjected to vertical and horizontal loads. A pallet rack structures is analysed by considering the stability equations of an equivalent free-sway column. The effects of semi-rigid beam-to-upright, splice-to-upright and base-plate-to-upright connections are fully incorporated into the analysis. Each section of upright between successive beam levels in the pallet rack is considered to be a single column element with two rotational degrees of freedom. A computer algebra package was used to determine modified stability equations for column elements containing splices. The influence of the position of splices in a pallet rack is clearly demonstrated.rn