Finite element analysis and design of crest-fixed trapezoidal steel claddings with wide pans subject to pull-through failures

Crest-fixed trapezoidal steel claddings made of thin, high strength steels often suffer from local pull-through failures at their screw connections during high wind events. Loss of claddings often leads to a progressive collapse of the entire building. At present the design of these cladding systems is mainly based on laboratory testing. Since the local pull-through failures in these less ductile high strength steel claddings are often initiated by transverse splitting at the fastener holes, analytical studies have not been able to determine the pull-through failure loads accurately. However, an appropriate splitting/fracture criterion has been developed recently using a series of large scale experiments of crest-fixed steel claddings. A finite element model has then been developed for trapezoidal steel cladding with wide pans that included the new splitting criterion and other advanced features including geometric imperfections, residual stresses, buckling effects, contact modelling and hyperelastic behaviour of neoprene washers. A series of parametric studies considering the effects of material properties and geometric parameters of trapezoidal claddings was undertaken using finite element analysis. Design formulae for the local failure loads were then derived for design and optimization purposes. This paper presents the details of the numerical study, the results and design recommendations.