Sensitivity analysis of stability problems of steel plane frames

The objective of the paper is to analyse the influence of initial imperfections on the load-carrying capacity of a single storey steel plane frame comprised of two columns loaded in compression. The influence of the variance of initial imperfections on the variance of the load-carrying capacity was calculated by means of Sobol’ sensitivity analysis. Monte Carlo based procedures were used for computing full sets of first order and second order sensitivity indices of the model. The geometrical nonlinear finite element solution, which provides numerical results per run, was employed. The mutual dependence of sensitivity indices and column non-dimensional slenderness is analysed. The derivation of the statistical characteristics of system imperfections of the initial inclination of columns is described in the introduction of the present work. Material and geometrical characteristics of hot-rolled IPE members were considered to be random quantities with histograms obtained from experiments. The Sobol sensitivity analysis is used to identify the crucial input random imperfections and their higher order interaction effects.