Research on Bearing Capacity Calculation of Parabolic Steel Arch Structure under Full-Span and Half-Span Loading

The current Chinese design specification of steel arch structure lacks full of bearing performance when checking its in-plane stability under asymmetric load. In order to overcome this disadvantage, the nonlinear finite element method was used for the ultimate load analysis of parabolic steel arch structure under full-span and half-span loads with different combination ratio. The calculated results show that ultimate load based on the specification is close to that based on the finite element analysis of model with geometrical defects; but is quite different from that based on the finite element analysis of perfect model; when half-span load accounts for a large proportion, the ultimate load based on the finite element analysis of geometrical defect model is higher than that based on the finite element analysis of perfect model.