Numerical investigation of H-shaped short steel piles with localized severe corrosion

•A non-linear FE mode is developed for inelastic buckling of locally corroded piles.•Effect of degree of corrosion, residual stresses, member slenderness analyzed.•FEA predictions validated experimentally and compared to three design models.•Three damage classifications and rehabilitation guidelines are proposed.

Evaluation of the capacity of steel bridge piles with localized severe corrosion is an important task for maintenance and retrofit activities. To facilitate maintenance and rehabilitation activities for deteriorated H-piles, numerical simulation for inelastic buckling of small-scale piles was conducted. The non-linear finite element model included the effect of initial geometric imperfection, residual stresses, material non-linearity, and geometric non-linearity at various levels of deterioration. The model was validated using experimental results of small-scale piles. A parametric study was conducted to analyze different factors that affect the axial capacity and failure mode of these piles. The parameters that were considered include the magnitude of initial imperfections, residual stresses, slenderness of the pile, location and extent of the corroded region, and severity of corrosion. Different pile slendernesses were considered ranging from 32 to 64. Different levels of corrosion were simulated by reducing the thickness of the flanges and web by 20–100%. The corroded length was varied from 15.2 cm, 30.5 cm and 61.0 cm. Different deterioration locations, namely mid-height and third-height of the pile, were considered. Numerical analysis results were compared to three design methods from current AASHTO (2012) [1], AISC (2011) [2], and AISI (2007) [3] specifications. A damage classification system is proposed based on the remaining capacity of the corroded pile and rehabilitation guidelines are suggested.