On the use of linear-elastic local stresses to design load-carrying fillet-welded steel joints against static loading

• The TCD is successful in estimating static strength of steel arc welded joints.
• For steel arc welded joints, the PM critical distance is taken equal to 3.5 mm.
• The inherent material strength is taken equal to 1.35 σUTSσUTS.
• The TCD is recommended to be used by adopting safety factors larger than 1.25.

This paper uses local linear-elastic stresses to estimate the static strength of steel arc welded joints. The proposed design methodology was developed by taking as a starting point the fundamental concepts on which the Theory of Critical Distances (TCD) is based. The overall accuracy of the devised approach was checked against a number of experimental results taken from the literature and generated by testing a variety of welded geometries. Such a systematic validation exercise demonstrated that the TCD is highly accurate in estimating the static strength of arc welded joints irrespective of the complexity of the assessed welded detail’s geometry.