Cold formed steel sections

Content :-

1) Introduction
2) Forming method & it’s shape
3) Hot rolled v/s cold formed steel
section(comparison)
4) Application
5) Advantages
6) Some definition & codal Provision
7) Behavior of cold form steel
Introduction :-
 Thin sheet steel products are used in building
industry and range from purlins to roof sheeting
and floor decking , Generally these are available
for use as basic building elements for assembly
at site or as prefabricated frames or panels.
 These thin steel sections are cold-formed, i.e.
their manufacturing process involves forming
steel sections in a cold state (i.e. without
application of heat) from steel sheets of
uniform thickness.
 These are called as Cold Formed Steel
Sections.
 These sections are also called Light Gauge Steel
Sections or Cold Rolled Steel
 These are generally used for light and moderate
loads and for structural members of short
lengths.
 Cold formed steel (CFS) members are made
from structural quality sheet steel that are
formed into shape either through press-braking
blanks, sheared from sheets or coils, or more
commonly, by roll forming the steel through a
series of dies. (No heat is required )
 It is thinner, lighter, easier to produce, cheaper
then hot-rolled section.
 Thickness of steel sheet is varied from 0.4mm to
25mm.
Forming method :-
 The common cold rolled products are coils and
sheets.
 Cold rolled sheets could be made as thin as 0.3
mm. Cold-forming is a process by which the
sheets (hot rolled / cold rolled) are folded in to
desired section profile by a series of forming rolls
in a continuous train of roller sets.
 Such thin shapes are impossible to be produced
by hot rolling. These cold formed sheet steels are
basically low carbon steels (<0.1 % carbon).
 There are generally three methods used in the
manufacture of cold-formed
1. Cold roll forming
2. Press brake operation
3. Bending brake operation

1) Cold Roll Forming :-

 The method of cold roll forming has been widely
used for the production of building components
such as individual structural members and some
roof, floor, and wall panels and corrugated sheets.
2) Press Brake :-
 The press brake operation may be used under the
following conditions:
1. The section is of simple configuration.
2. The required quantity is less than about 300
linear ft /min (91.5 m/min).
3. The section to be produced is relatively wide
[usually more than 18 in. (457mm)] such as
roof sheets and decking units.
 The equipment used in the press brake operation
consists essentially of a moving top beam and a
stationary bottom bed on which the dies
applicable to the particular required product are
mounted.
3) Bending brake operation :-
 Most shops that process heavy-gage materials
use press brakes. Light-gage metal typically
forms through bending machines.
 In bending brake machine a workpiece placed
between upper and lower dies forms through
the force and pressure exerted by lowering the
ram. It is a specialized type of press consisting
of a long, narrow ram and bed. Manufacturers
offer press brakes in a variety of sizes and
capabilities
 In Bending dies comprise the bulk of press-
brake tooling, other tooling performs punching,
countersinking, and embossing operations.
 Some of the manufacturer are in India
Shapes:-
 The shapes of cold-formed sections used in
industrial applications are necessarily shaped to
meet the specific requirement of the loading
conditions and the utility.
 Most common sections in building applications
are C & Z sections with wide variation in their
original forms to enhance the efficiency of these
sections with use of lips and stiffeners.
Comparison:-
Hot rolled Cold formed
section section

Thicker than cold- Thinner than hot-

formed sections rolled sections

Local instabilities are Behavior is necessarily

not exhibited characterized by local
instabilities

No post buckling Local buckling is

strength helped by post
buckling strength

Manufacturing process • Manufacturing

involves heat treatment process does not
involve heat .
Hot rolled Cold formed
section section
Cross sectional shapes
Close tolerances are
not possible. & are formed to close
tolerances and these can
Also sections change be consistently repeated
per batch.
for as long as required.
Limited types of
shapes can be Cold rolling can be
produced. employed to produce
Also weight limits its almost any desired shape
to Length. to any desired length.

High strength to
weight ratio as High strength to weight
compared to ratio is achieved in
reinforced concrete cold-rolled products.
but not as high as
cold-formed sections.
Application:-
1. Roof and Wall members

2. Purlins and Side railing

3. Light Steel Framing

4. Housing

5. Lintels

6. Floor Joists

7. Systems for Commercial Buildings

8. Roof Trusses

9. Stud-Walling - Separating Walls and Partitions

10.Space Trusses

11. Infill Walling and Over-Cladding

12. Prefabricated Modular Buildings

13. Frameless Steel Buildings

14. Storage Racking

15. Composite Decking

Advantages:-
 Advantages of using cold-formed sections are :

1. Long span compatibility and capacity to form

shape to suit specific application.

2. Dimensional accuracy.

3. Long term durability in internal environments.

4. Freedom from long term creep and shrinkage.

5. Ease of construction, as members are delivered
to site cut to length and with pre-punched
holes, requiring no further fabrication.

6. Ability to be fabricated into sub-frames as wall

panels etc.

7. Robustness (sturdy), but sufficiently light for

site handling.
Definition & its codal Provision
1) Stiffened & Unstiffened Compression
Elements :-
 An unstiffened element is one, which is supported
along one longitudinal edge only with the other
parallel edge being free to displace.
 An element which is supported by webs along both
its longitudinal edges is called a stiffened element.
 An intermittently stiffened element is made of a
very wide thin element which has been divided
into two or more narrow sub elements by the
introduction of intermediate stiffeners, formed
during rolling.
 An Element that is stiffened between webs, or
between a web and a stiffened edge by means of
intermediate stiffeners which are parallel to the
direction of stress.
 A sub-element is the portion between adjacent
stiffeners or between web and intermediate
stiffener or between edge and intermediate
stiffener.
Behavior of cold formed steel :-
A) BEHAVIOUR OF THIN PLATES IN
COMPRESSION
1) Elastic Buckling
 The behavior of cold-formed sections is
governed by the local buckling phenomenon.
Due to high width to thickness ratios, the
sections undergo local deformation before
yielding.
 There exists post-buckling strength on account
of which the sections continues to take load
without failure.
 This Local buckling is an extremely important
aspect of cold formed steel sections as very thin
elements used will invariably buckle before
yielding.
 Thinner the plate, the lower will be the load at
which the buckles will form. Full compression
resistance of a perfectly flat plate supported on
two longitudinal edges can be developed for a
w/t ratio of about 40.
 At greater widths, buckles form elastically
causing a loss in overall compressive strength of
plate. This is due to the inability of the more
flexible central portion to resist as much
compression as the outer portions.
 Critical compressive stress at which elastic
buckling of the plate occurs is given by
2) Post-Critical Behavior :-
 The elastic local buckling phenomenon occurs
preferentially in flat width ratio range of 30 to
60, as the elements are not purely flat and a
state of non-uniform stress exists throughout
the loading regime. But for the flat width ratios
exceeding 60, the inplane tension stresses
develop which resist further buckling, and zone
of compression yielding from the longitudinal
supports to covering a greater width of
elements.
 These post-critical effects cause an effective
load-carrying capacity of wide plate relative to a
value as given by above mention Equation Due
to high width to thickness ratios, the sections
undergo local deformation before yielding.
 There exists post-buckling strength on
account of which the sections continues to
take load without failure.
3) Effective Width Concept
 The effects of local buckling can be evaluated
by using the concept of effective width.
 Lightly stressed regions at centre are ignored,
as these are least effective in resisting the
applied stresses. Regions near the supports
are far more effective and are taken to be
fully effective.
 The section behavior is modeled on the basis
of the effective width (beff) sketched
 This effective width, (beff) multiplied by the
edge stress (ƒ) is the same as the mean stress
across the section multiplied by the total width
(b) of the compression member.
 The effective width of an element under
compression is dependent on the magnitude of
the applied stress (Fc), the width/thickness ratio
of the element and the edge support conditions
B) Behavior of web
 The behavior of webs of cold-formed sections’
is quite important from the design and
effectiveness point of view.
 Webs generally are subjected to and are
affected by
1) web shear
2) web bending
3) web crushing & crippling
1) Web shear:-
 Slender webs normally buckle due to transfer of
shear from web section incapable of transfer
and fail due to shear buckling usually initiated by
eccentric load not along plane of web.
 Normally the limiting height to width ratio of
web will suffice for light loads along with limiting
the average shear stress to 0.6 Fy as which the
shear yielding occurs.
2) Web bending :-
 The webs are subjected to maximum stresses at
their junction with the compression flanges. Thus,
it must be noted that in very deep webs the web
sections can also be affected by the local buckling
phenomenon, hence reducing the net effective
section of the web as well like compression
flanges.
 This quite differs from the normal section under
compression, as the stress is varying along the
depth of the web section.
3) Web crushing & crippling :-
 Web crippling at points of concentrated loads
and supports can be a critical problem in cold-
formed steel structural members and sheeting
for the following reasons,
1. In cold-formed design, it is often not practical
to provide load bearing and end bearing
stiffeners. This is always the case in continuous
sheeting and decking spanning several support
points.
2. The depth to thickness ratios of the webs are
usually much larger.
3. In many cases the webs are inclined rather
than vertical.
4.The load is generally applied to the flange,
which causes the load to be eccentric to the
web and causes the initial bending in the web
even before crippling takes place.
 The larger the corner radius the larger the
effect of web crippling.
3) Behavior in flexure :-
a) Lateral torsional buckling
 Lateral buckling will not occur if the beam
under loading bends only about the minor axis.
 If the beam is provided with lateral restraints,
capable of resisting a lateral force of 3% of the
maximum force in the compression flange, the
beam may be regarded as restrained and no
lateral buckling will occur.
 In case of cold-formed steel sections, they have
low torsional stiffness as they are thin.
 Many of the sections produced by cold-forming
are generally of singly symmetric nature. Hence,
the shear centre does not coincide the
centroidal axis at which they are loaded.
 If the section would have been loaded along the
shear centre axis there would have been only
flexural bending.
 The thin flanges tend to buckle in bending
compression and result in overall lateral
buckling with twisting. This phenomenon is
specifically know as flexural torsional buckling.
References:-
 IS 801-1975 “Code of Practice for Use of Cold-
Formed Light Gauge Steel Structural
Members in General Building Construction”,
Bureau Of Indian Standards, New Delhi.
 Design of steel structure, IIT Madras,
by Prof.S.R.Satishkumar & Prof.
A.R.Shanthakumar
 Cold formed steel structures(design analysis &
construction) ,tata Mc-graw hill publication
by-Wei-Wen Yu,(Ph.D.)
Thank you