Extended Rankine approach for bi-axially loaded steel columns under natural fire

Up till now, there has been limited research work conducted on bi-axially loaded steel columns under fire conditions. Under normal ambient temperature, the load-bearing capacity of steel columns is governed by the interaction of strength and stability considerations, which gives rise to the Rankine method. The authors extended this method to predict the fire resistance of steel columns subjected to bi-axial loading under standard fire curve. Basically, the authors developed an interaction equation based on failure surface to account for the effects of axial load and bending moments in two directions. Predictions from the proposed approach were benchmarked against a well-established finite element program SAFIR for steel columns under standard fire conditions. The same approach is then extended to include natural fire curves. To model a compartment fire with different geometries, thermal characteristics of boundary walls, different fire loads and ventilation factors, a zone fire modelling program Ozone was used. Coupling Ozone to SAFIR, the failure times of steel columns in a compartment fire were predicted. These numerical predictions were compared with those from the proposed approach and reasonable agreement was obtained.