Study on stiffness deterioration in steel-concrete composite beams under fatigue loading

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the degradation law of stiffness of steel-concrete composite beams after certain fatigue loads. First, six test beams with stud connectors were designed and fabricated for static and fatigue tests. The resultant failure modes under different fatigue loading cycles were compared. And an analysis was performed for the variations in the load-deflection curves, residual deflections and relative slips of the composite beams during fatigue loading. Then, the correlations among the stiffness degradation of each test beam, the residual deflection and relative slip growth during the fatigue test were investigated, in order to clarify the primary reasons for the stiffness degradation of the composite beams. Finally, based on the stiffness degradation function under fatigue loading, a calculation model for the residual stiffness of composite beams in response to fatigue loading cycles was established by parameter fitting. The results show that the stiffness of composite beams undergoes irreversible degradation under fatigue loading. And stiffness degradation is associated with the macrobehavior of material fatigue damage and shear connection degradation. In addition, the stiffness degradation of the composite beams exhibit S-shaped monotonic decreasing trends with fatigue cycles. The general agreement between the calculation model and experiment shows good applicability of the proposed model for specific beam size and fatigue load parameters. Moreover, the research results provide a method for establishing a stiffness degradation model for composite beams after fatigue loading.