Output details

Accurate Determination of Plastic Collapse Loads From Finite Element Analyses

Within Eurocode EN1993-1-6 two base line measures have to be found before the strength of structures can be calculated. One of these measures is the plastic limit load. As numerically this limit is sometimes difficult to calculate several ways of estimating the limit loads are allowed within the code. This paper shows that the estimates are wrong and unsafe i.e. the structure might fail using such an estimate and offers a new technique to calculate safe values easily. This technique is planned for the next edition of recommendations to the Eurocode and will have wide implications for practising engineers.