Plastic mechanism analyses of circular tubular members under cyclic loading

This paper presents plastic mechanism analyses of circular tubular members under cyclic loading. In particular, it provides new methods of analyses for circular hollow sections subjected to a constant amplitude cyclic pure bending (CCPB) and a large axial compression–tension cycle (ACTC). The procedure described herein for CCPB considers both prebuckling deformation and local buckling. The prebuckling deformation was simulated using a progressively deforming elliptical cross-section which was observed during the test. The local buckling analysis was performed using a rigid plastic mechanism analysis. Good agreement was found between the predicted and measured hysteresis. However, the present model over-estimates the strength and absorbed energy. For the ACTC, good agreement was found between the predicted and measured collapse curves within the compression half-cycle. More work is needed to model the effect of tension developed during the remaining of the loading cycle. The present models consider the actual local buckling deformation of the cross-section and also avoid the complexity involved in the numerical analyses since they provide the most commonly used closed-form solutions.