Bending behavior of concrete-encased composite I-girder with corrugated steel web

• We proposed a new type of partially encased composite I-girder with corrugated web.
• Flexural behavior of steel and composite girders with flat or corrugated web under bending moment has been experimentally and analytically investigated.
• Limitation of width-to-thickness ratios for steel and composite I-girders with corrugated web were suggested to prevent local buckling of compressive flange.
• Analytical methods of bending strength under service and ultimate state were proposed and verified by experimental results.

A partially encased composite I-girder with flat or corrugated web has been proposed to improve the structural performance of continuous composite girder under hogging moment. The flexural behavior of such structure under two points symmetric loading has been experimentally and analytically investigated. Static flexural loading tests showed that the partially encased girder improved bending strength in comparison to steel I-girder, as local bucking of steel flange was restricted by encased concrete. Especially for the corrugated web girder, the ultimate bending strength was improved about 20%, and the ductility also increased about 3 times. In addition, the limitation of width-to-thickness ratios for steel and concrete-encased composite I-girders with corrugated web were suggested to prevent premature failure due to local buckling of compressive flange. Moreover, the analytical methods of flexural strength under service and ultimate state for partially encased composite girder were proposed and verified with experimental results. It was found that the analytical bending strengths agreed well with the experimental ones at both service and ultimate state, which means the proposed analytical equations can be applied in predicting flexural strength accurately for such encased composite girder with flat or corrugated web.