Repair of buckled steel braces via buckling zone relocation method

In this study a new repair method, called buckling zone relocation, for buckled steel braces is presented. In this method, buckled zone of the steel brace is wrapped with steel plates to relocate the buckling zone toward the undamaged locations of the brace. Thus, the brace can be reach buckling load again. The effectiveness of the proposed method was experimentally investigated. To do this, 2 tubular brace specimens, each have 2000 mm length and 70×70×3 mm cross section, were subjected to quasi-static cyclic loadings. First specimen were loaded until global buckling and then unloaded to repair with the proposed method. The length of the buckling zone to be repaired with steel plates was determined with finite element analysis. When the repair process completed, the specimen reloaded until collapse. The second specimen was loaded until collapse to be used as reference member. As a result, it was determined that the buckled steel brace tested in this study could been effectively repaired via buckling zone relocation method without any significant decrease in its performance.