Mechanical performances of concrete-filled steel tubular stub columns with round ends under axial loading

• The shape of steel tube is round-ended steel tube.
• A 3D FE model is developed to analyze the mechanical properties of the CFRT columns.
• A practical calculation formula for the CFRT stub columns is proposed.

An experimental study of 22 concrete-filled round-ended steel tubular (CFRT) stub columns under axial compression is conducted compared with 4 circular concrete-filled steel tubular (CFT) stub columns. The influences of width–thickness ratio, concrete strength, steel yield strength and wall-thickness of steel tube on the ultimate bearing capacity of the CFRT columns are discussed. The 3D finite element (FE) model is also developed to analyze the behavior of the CFRT columns under axial compression. From the results, local buckling of the round-ended steel tube associated with shear failure of in-filled concrete could be observed. With the increasing width–thickness ratio, the corresponding load–strain curves have a shorter elastic–plastic stage. The parametric studies indicate that the concrete strength, tube thickness and width–thickness ratio of the steel tube also have a great effect on the ultimate bearing capacity. The numerical results also show that the confinement effect of the stub columns decreases with the increasing width–thickness ratio. A practical calculation formula for the bearing capacity of the CFRT stub columns is proposed, which is well in agreement with the experimental results.