Testing of steel sheathed cold-formed steel trussed shear walls

• A novel cold-formed steel shear wall system was developed.
• An experimental study on the performance of this wall was conducted.
• The connection failure modes allowed shear walls to dissipate more energy.
• The influence of different configurations on the performance of shear walls was discussed.
• This wall gave a significantly higher ultimate strength than conventional wall.

This research is focused on the behavior of a novel cold-formed steel (CFS) shear wall system- steel sheathed cold-formed steel trussed shear wall (SSCFSTSW), which is different in skeleton configuration compared to conventional steel sheathed CFS framed shear wall. A test program was conducted on shear walls of various configurations. The walls differed in sheathing, chord studs and skeleton configurations. The results indicated that SSCFSTSW gave a significantly higher ultimate strength than that obtained from conventional shear walls. Based on the results, detailed discussion of the influence of different configurations on the performance of shear walls is given.