NONLINEAR ANALYSIS OF SPACE TRUSSES TOWARDS COMPOSITE ACTION WITH FERROCEMENT SLABS

The purpose of composite action is to make two materials with different properties interact so that full utilization of the components can be achieved. Earlier studies on space truss have showed that the composite action has been found to improve joint stability and truss reliability in general. A particularly popular approach is to use concrete slabs with decking sheets for the top chord members. However, the weight of the concrete slabs creates problems with this approach. In this paper, extension experimental results of composite action between steel sheets decking and ferrocement slabs are presented. Also, mathematical models for nonlinear analysis of space trusses are presented. The ANSYS program was used to build these models based on finite element analysis and its performance is demonstrated via numerical experiments.