Improved design of stainless steel structural members

Structural sections manufactured from stainless steel possess several features that mean that their response to loading differs from that of equivalent members made from carbon steel. To date these features have not really been recognised in design codes, which have largely adapted rules devised for carbon steel in a rather simplistic fashion. Recently, a new approach for dealing with local buckling and the associated loss of effectiveness that does not utilise the concepts of either cross-sectional classification or effective cross-sectional properties has been developed; it is therefore particularly well suited to dealing with stainless steel. Originally the concept was restricted in application to closed sections. It is extended herein to cover both open and closed cross-sections. It is then incorporated in the procedures for designing columns and beam-columns based on the Eurocode approaches and it is shown that by making further modifications the accuracy of these methods can be significantly improved. The resulting design procedures are no lengthier than those currently given in the stainless steel part of EC3.