Composite Beams with Limited-Slip-Capacity Shear Connectors

The flexural strength of steel and concrete composite beams in buildings is affected by both the strength and the ductility of the mechanical shear connections between the steel and concrete components of the composite beam. Design techniques can easily allow for the variation in the shear-connector strengths, but one of the most intractable problems in composite-beam construction is to allow for the limited slip that these mechanical shear connectors have been found to exhibit. Present design techniques try to prevent the connector fracturing, which occurs through excessive slip, by placing limits on the maximum span and the minimum strength of the shear connection. A procedure has been developed that directly relates the flexural strength of a composite beam with both the strength and ductility of the shear connectors, and thus can be used to design against premature failure through fracture of the connectors due to excessive slip.