GEM - A SOFTWARE FOR STABILITY VERIFICATION OF NON- UNIFORM MEMBERS Adaptation of the General Method procedure to fire design

Abstract

There is currently no specific rules in Part 1-2 of Eurocode 3 for the stability verification of non-uniform members under fire conditions. For normal temperature, Part 1-1 of the same code provides a General Method to check the stability against lateral and lateral-torsional buckling for these type of members, though it requires some extensive calculations. It is here demonstrated in this paper how both problems can be addressed, by exposing a procedure that accounts for the modifications of the method at elevated temperatures, and by showing its implementation within a computer program. It is also shown how the program can be used to assess the study of the method itself, by applying it to a case of a web-tapered beam-column and comparing it to numerical results.