Digitally Augmented Database of Fracture-Critical Steel Beam-to-Column Connection tests

This paper describes a recently compiled database of 100 full-scale steel beam-to-column connections that failed due to flange fracture. This database focuses on welded flange connections tested in the past 50 years, including tests with strong panel zones and box columns that have been excluded from previous collections. To extend the information from each experiment beyond the recorded response, this database is augmented with high-fidelity structural models carefully calibrated to the test data using a semi-automatic algorithm. Once calibrated, these models offer a versatile method to decompose the total displacement response of the connections in beam, panel zone, and column deformations and extract more detailed response quantities, such as the flange’s stress history. This augmented database enables a deeper understanding of the causes of flange fracture and an assessment of the common rotation limits in ASCE/SEI 41 employed for simulating fracture. Results show that these rotation limits have a considerably large error. Furthermore, these rotation limits are incapable of either identifying the flange that would fracture first or simulating the opening and closing behavior of a fractured flange. The flange’s stress histories extracted with the models is a more efficient demand parameter to characterize fracture behavior.