Load capacity of continuous decking based on small-scale tests

•Design of composite decking to North American practice and Eurocodes is presented.•A formula is presented for elastic re-distribution of negative moment in 2 span decking.•Results of bending tests on 80 mm deep deck profiles in two spans are presented.•Small-scale tests to simulate bending and web crushing at internal supports are presented.•Serviceability limits are proposed to avoid irreversible deformations under pattern loads.

A design method for continuous profiled decking based on post-elastic moment re-distribution is presented. This method is based on that permitted in EN 1993-1-3: Eurocode 3, and in this paper, its application to highly stiffened composite deck profiles is explored. The new aspect is the way in which the residual negative bending moment is established at high rotations using a non-linear moment–rotation stiffness relationship.Tests on three modern deck profiles of 80 mm depths are presented. It was found that the degree of redistribution of negative moment can be high, and so the stiffness coefficient used for deflection calculations should also reflect the degree of redistribution of moment that occurs at the serviceability limit state.