Comparing the Behavior of Reinforced Concrete Columns Embedded in Walls and Subjected to Fire

Abstract

: Fire is an exceptional action that may occur during the life of a building. So, it must be considered when designing a building structure. The standards provide several types of design methods for that propose, used for single elements, parts of structure or the structure as a whole. The fire design of columns is important both for new project as for remodel buildings and also for verification of the residual resistance of columns that have suffered a fire accident. In this way, the aim of this work is to analyze numerically different ways of fire exposure to check the compressive strength of the columns when subjected to fire and the influence of the adjacent walls to a column in case of fire. The thermal advanced analysis of the sections columns was performed using the finite element software, Abaqus CAE, where the standard fire curve, ISO 834 (International Organization for Standardization 834), was used, with 4 h of fire duration. It was possible, with the two methods used in this work, to compare them to verify which model is more conservative and which is closer to the advanced numerical model, for calculating temperatures in the column section. It was checked that the walls act as thermal insulators, protecting part of the columns from the convection and radiation of the fire. Consequently, the effects of raising the temperature over the compressive resistance of the reinforced concrete column, were reduced.