Girders with trapezoidally corrugated webs subjected by combination of bending, shear and path loading

• M–V–F interaction behavior of girders with corrugated webs are investigated.
• Previous design proposals are studied and compared.
• Structural behavior under the combined loading situation is analysed.
• New design interaction equation is proposed for interaction behavior.

Steel girders with corrugated webs are increasingly used in the field of bridges, especially in case of composite bridges. During launching of a bridge structure the girder can be subjected by the combination of bending moment (M), shear (V) and transverse forces (F) which result in a complex stress field in the girder and in an interacting stability problem. Previous research activities related to the corrugated web girders showed that the structural behavior of the girders with corrugated webs differ from the conventional I-girders, especially in the stress distribution of the flanges and the web. On the other hand the stability behavior of the corrugated web girders are also different from the flat web girders due to the corrugation profile therefore the interaction equations developed for conventional I-girders cannot be used for corrugated web girders. There is a lack of investigations analyzing the effect of the complex loading situation for corrugated web girders, therefore the current paper focuses on the investigation of the structural behavior under all of the aforementioned actions and their combinations. Based on the previous and current investigations design interaction equation is developed for the combined M–V–F loading situation.