Design optimization of nonuniform stiffened steel plate girders -lrfd vs.ASD procedures

摘要

The paper presents the results of a design procedure (nongradient-based) that has been automated to obtain a minimum weight design of nonuniform stiffened steel plate girders. The procedure allows the use of either the ASD guidelines or the LRFD guidelines to obtain the required design. The results of numerical studies performed to obtain a minimum weight design of a three-span nonuniform stiffened plate girder are summarized to: (1) highlight differences between values obtained from these two design procedures; (2) emphasize effectiveness of applying the procedure to a design problem as compared to the use of a generalized gradient-based design procedure.