Investigations on rebar shear connectors in steel concrete composite beams

Abstract

Shear connectors play a vital role in steel concrete composite beams as they ensure that the two different materials steel beam and concrete slab that constitute the composite section act as a single unit They also resist vertical uplift forces at the steel concrete interface and allow the transfer of forces between steel and concrete The headed stud is the most commonly used shear connector in composite construction so far Its popularity is mainly due to its proven performance and ease installation But economic considerations continue to motivate development of new products in the field of shear connectors Several different types of shear connectors have been studies as alternatives to the stud type shear connector and these are reported in the literature Usability of the standoff screw as shear connector was studied by Alander 1998 They suggested Elco Grade 8 standoff screw to be an effective alternative to stud shear connectors Pashan 2006 presented the studies on the behavior of channel shaped connectors and recommended empirical formulae for the strength of such connectors The behavior of channel shear connector was also studies experimentally and analytically by Maleki et al 2008 The behavior of shear connector prepared from perforated steel plate was studied by Kim et al 2011 A comparative study between the behavior of channel and angel shear connectors was reported by Shariati et al 2013 Use of straight rebar pieces Turkish earthquake resistant Grade Fe 500 as shear connector has been studies by Koken et al 2014 They reported that such connector resulted in higher ultimate strength in comparison to stud shear connector newline