Confinement coefficient of concrete-filled square stainless steel tubular stub columns

The objective of this paper is to investigate the confinement coefficient of concrete-filled square stainless steel tubular (CFSSST) stub columns under axial loading. A fine finite 3D solid element model was established, which utilized a constitutive model of stainless steel considering the strain-hardening characteristics and a triaxial plastic-damage constitutive model of concrete with features of the parameter certainty under axial compression. The finite element analysis results revealed that the increased ultimate bearing capacity of CFSSST stub columns compared with their carbon steel counterparts was mainly due to that the composite action of CFSSST stub columns is stronger than that of carbon steel counterparts. A further parametric study was carried out based on the verified model, and it was found that the stress contribution of the stainless steel tube is higher than the carbon steel tube. The stress nephogram was simplified reasonably in accordance with the limit state of core concrete and a theoretical formula was proposed to estimate the ultimate bearing capacity of square CFSSST stub columns using superposition method. The predicted results showed satisfactory agreement with both the experimental and FE results. Finally, the comparisons of the experimental and predicted results using the proposed formula and the existing codes were illustrated.