Experimental and numerical study of unstiffened steel plate shear wall structures

•Four unstiffened steel plate shear walls under cyclic loads were carried out.•Numerical method of unstiffened steel plate shear wall was proposed.•The in-plane and out-of-plane stiffness suggestions of edge column were proposed.

In order to investigate the seismic behaviors of unstiffened thin steel plate shear wall structure, tests of four three-story unstiffened steel plate shear wall specimens under cyclic loads were carried out. Parameters of the specimens included height-to-thickness ratio, span-to-height ratio and middle brace. The carrying capacity, hysteretic behavior, degraded characteristics, ductility, failure modes, energy dissipation capacity were analyzed and compared deeply. Besides, the nonlinear finite element method of shear wall structure was also established, which was verified by test results. Finally, the effect of column stiffness on load-carrying capacity was studied. The practical requirements of in-plane and out-of-plane stiffness of edge column were suggested. The experimental and numerical results showed that: this kind structure exhibits high strength, good energy dissipation capacity, and good ductility (the ductility coefficients are more than 3.0). When the inter-story drift angle reaches 1/50, the strength degradation is no more than 5%, indicating that the structure has good seismic behaviors. The span-to-height ratio has little effect on load-carrying capacity, while slightly affects the initial stiffness and ductility. The effect of height-to-thickness ratio (thickness) on load-carrying capacity is relatively larger than other factors. The middle braces do not improve the behaviors of structures. The stiffness of edge column has great effect on lateral load-carrying capacity of shear wall structures. The value of column stiffness index could be within 2.0–2.5 to achieve the sufficient constraints and economical benefit.