THE CONTRIBUTING EFFECT OF CLADDING PANELS IN STEEL STRUCTURE BUILDINGS SUBJECTED TO SEISMIC ACTIONS

摘要

The main results obtained within a European project dealing with the influence of lightweight cladding panels on the response of steel structures subjected to aeloian and seismic actions are summarised in this paper. The research, which has been developed from 1993to 1998, was organised in four phases. The first one was devoted to analyse the state-of-the-art, pointing out the main motivations on which the so called` stressed skin design' philosophy is based. The second phase was addressed to the experimental characterisation of the mechanical behaviour of sandwich cladding panels. The last two phases concerned with the theoretical and numerical evaluation of the diaphragm effect to be accounted for in designing typical residential and industrial steel buildings.