Finding the optimal stress state of a stainless-steel IPE profile for fatigue experiments

Abstract

Pilot fatigue experiments of a stainless-steel IPE80 profile showed local bending at the top flange and a global stability loss. Therefore, in this paper we present a non-linear numerical study of such profile to achieve an optimal stress state and reduce the possible stability loss and to keep the stress distribution close to Euler-Bernoulli’s beam theory. This was assessed by reaching a tensile stress in the bottom flange less than the material’s yielding strength and by a varying span to the profile’s height and by varying the loading options from three-point bending to four-point bending.