Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

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Journal of Building Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jobe

Quantification of the critical displacement initiating collapse of

steel moment frames due to an interior column loss
Jing-Zhou Zhang a, Guo-Qiang Li b, Yuan-Zuo Wang c, d, *, Hui Li e
a
School of Civil Engineering, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou, 510006, China
b
College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, China
c
The Key Laboratory of Urban Security and Disaster Engineering of Ministry of Education, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing, 100124, China
d
Faculty of Engineering, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido, 060-8628, Japan
e
Scientific and Technological Innovation Center, Beijing, 100012, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Quantification of the critical collapse displacement is important to establish the collapse-resistant
Steel frame design method for the steel frame under a column-removal scenario. In this paper, the critical
Column-removal collapse displacement of steel frames due to an interior column loss is studied. The Bai-Wierzbicki
Collapse fracture model of steel is incorporated into ABAQUS via user subroutine, in which the effects of
Critical displacement both stress triaxiality and Lode angle on the fracture strain of steel are considered. The effects of
Boundary condition
the depth, span, axial restraint and rotational restraint of the beam on its critical collapse
displacement are studied. The relationships of the critical collapse displacement with the depth,
span and boundary conditions of the beam are established. The reliability of the proposed method
is validated against the test results. It is found that the ratio of the critical collapse displacement
to the depth of the beam can be expressed as a linear function of the span-to-depth ratio of the
beam. The rotational restraint of the beam mainly affects the transition stage of the resistance-
displacement curve of the beam and it has limited effect on the critical collapse displacement
of the beam. The axial restraint mainly affects the catenary stage of the resistance-displacement
curve of the beam and when the axial stiffness ratio exceeds 0.01, the effect of the rotational
restraint on the critical collapse displacement of the beam can be neglected.

1. Introduction
Steel frames are widely used in various buildings owing to their excellent mechanical performance and construction convenience.
In their service cycle, steel frames may suffer from unexpected man-made or natural disasters, in which some columns are damaged
and the remaining structure experiences large deformation. The structure is prone to disproportionately collapse when the neighboring
substructures fail to bridge over the loads initially sustained by the damaged columns. Realizing the severe loss of life and property in
the event of collapse, researchers worldwide have conducted large amounts of instructive studies on the robustness of the steel frame
against collapse.
To fully obtain the collapse behavior of the steel frame, experimental [1–5], analytical [6–11] and numerical [12–16] studies have
been conducted under a static column-removal scenario. Fu et al. [1] tested four 1/3-scaled beam-slab specimens to study the effects of

* Corresponding author. The Key Laboratory of Urban Security and Disaster Engineering of Ministry of Education, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing,
100124, China.
E-mail address: yzwang@bjut.edu.cn (Y.-Z. Wang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jobe.2022.104664
Received 19 April 2022; Received in revised form 9 May 2022; Accepted 13 May 2022
Available online 18 May 2022
2352-7102/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

aspect ratio, boundary restraint and shear connection degree on the collapse performance of the structure. Johnson et al. [2] conducted
a quasi-static test on one 1/2-scaled composite frame, of which one corner column, two side columns and one middle column were
consecutively removed. Wang et al. [3] studied the structural responses of one 21 bay full-scaled composite frame in a middle column
loss. Hadjioannou et al. [5] studied the robustness of the composite frame under a gravity load, the value of which is 1.5 times larger
than that specified by DoD [17]. Li et al. [7] and Zhang et al. [9] established analytical methods to predict the resistance-displacement
relationships of the composite frame in side and middle column losses, respectively. The most important finding from the above studies
is that at large deformation stage, the catenary action in steel beams and tensile membrane action in concrete floor systems can greatly
enhance the ultimate bearing capacity of the steel frame. Moreover, the slab aspect ratio, beam depth and boundary conditions of the
structure have significant effects on the resistance-displacement relationship of the frame during the column-removal process. To
consider the dynamic effect in the event of a sudden column loss, Chen et al. [18], Zhang et al. [19], Song et al. [20] and Li et al. [21]
conducted dynamic column-removal tests on the steel frames. Chen et al. [18] found that after the sudden middle column loss, the axial
force in the adjacent column was increased by more than 30%. Zhang et al. [19] found that after the sudden edge column loss, the
maximum vertical displacement of the frame is 50% greater than that in a static edge column loss. Li et al. [21] studied the strain rate
and damping effect on the maximum displacement of the steel frame after a sudden middle column loss. If the damping effect and
strain rate effect were excluded, the maximum displacement of the frame were 50% and 20% greater than the actual value, respec­
tively. This indicates that the effect of the damping was larger than that of the strain rate.
The ductility and load-bearing capacity of the beam-to-column joint have significant effect on the collapse behavior of the steel
frame. If the joint fails before the development of catenary action in the beam, the external load cannot be redistributed by the catenary
action. The behavior of different types of joints have attracted great attention from many researchers. Chen and Tan [22,23] studied
the collapse behavior of welded composite joints. In the test, the considered variables are slab thickness, shear connection degree and
connection type. Khandelwal and El-Tawil [24] studied the effects of beam depth, yield to ultimate strength ratio and storey number on
the formation of catenary action in the steel beam. Yang and Tan [25] tested different types of bolted steel beam-column joints in a
middle column loss. Lew et al. [26] studied the capacity of the steel moment connections on two full-scaled steel beam-column
substructures.
The above studies deeply revealed the collapse mechanism of different types of joints and provided valuable references for
practitioners in the profession. However, quantitative calculation method for determining the critical collapse displacement of steel
moment frame is rare in the literature. The critical collapse displacement refers to the vertical displacement at the column-removal
location, which initiates the collapse of the frame. As shown in Fig. 1, when a steel frame suffers from a column loss, the static
resistance-displacement curve of the frame can be simplified into a tri-linear model. At the tensile stage BC, the resistance of the steel
frame re-ascends significantly due to the development of the membrane action in the slab and catenary action in the beam. At the end
of stage BC, the steel frame may collapse due to the fracture of the beam or the beam-column connection. Therefore, the displacement
vC is defined as the critical collapse displacement of the frame due to a column loss. If the critical collapse displacement is quantified in
advance, the collapse resistance of steel frames can be easily determined. In current literatures, the ratio of the critical collapse
displacement to the span of the beam is usually assumed to be a constant value, such as 0.08 [27], 0.15 [28] and 0.2 [29]. However,
this may introduce significant errors because the critical collapse displacement of the steel frame is not only determined by the beam
span, but also by the depth and boundary condition of the beam. The test results by Guo et al. [30] and Li et al. [31] showed that the
ratio of the critical collapse displacement to the span of the beam is about 0.2. However, this value was found to be more than 0.33
based on the test result by Zhang et al. [4]. Therefore, reliable quantification of the critical collapse displacement is essential for
establishing the collapse-resistant design method of the steel frames.
To reliably predict the critical collapse displacement of the steel frame, a precise fracture model of steel is required. In terms of the

Fig. 1. Definition of the critical collapse displacement [29].

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

interaction between the constitutive model and fracture model, ductile fracture models of metallic materials are classified into two
categories, namely, coupled models and uncoupled models. For coupled models, the progressive deterioration of material properties,
including the elastic stiffness and strength are determined by the fracture model. The calculation efficiency of the coupled models is
relatively low. For the uncoupled models, the damage accumulation is not considered in the constitutive model of the metallic ma­
terial. It defines fracture ductility of the material as a stress-based or strain-based threshold. Many uncoupled fracture models are
proposed and used to predict the ductile fracture of structural steels [32–34]. Generally, the threshold representing the fracture
ductility of the material is characterized by the plastic strain at fracture. It can be seen from Bai-Wierzbicki model that the stress
triaxiality and Lode angle are two controlling parameters of the fracture strain of steel [34].
This paper presents a numerical study on the critical collapse displacement of steel frames with an interior-column-removal. The
Bai-Wierzbicki fracture model is incorporated into the finite element software ABAQUS, in which the effect of lode angle on the
fracture strain of steel is considered. Using numerical analyses, the effects of beam depth, beam span, axial restraint and rotational
restraint on the critical collapse displacement of steel frames is studied. Based on the numerical results, a design-based quantification
of the critical collapse displacement of steel frames with an interior column-removal is developed.

2. Fracture criterion
To reliably obtain the critical collapse displacement of the frame, reliable fracture criterion of steel should be used. Based on Bai-
Wierzbicki model (BWM), the fracture ductility of steel is determined by both the stress triaxiality and Lode angle [34].
The stress triaxiality is given by:
σm
η= (1)
σ

where σm and σ are the mean value of the stress and von Mises stress, respectively. σ m and σ are calculated by:
σ m = (σ1 + σ 2 + σ 3 ) / 3 (2)
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
1[ ]
σ= (σ 1 − σ2 )2 + (σ2 − σ 3 )2 + (σ 3 − σ1 )2 (3)
2
The load angel θ is given by Ref. [34]:
⎡⎛ ⎞3 ⎤
[27 ]1/3
1 ⎢⎜ (σ 1 − σm )(σ2 − σ m )(σ3 − σ m ) ⎟ ⎥
θ = arccos⎢⎜
⎣⎝
2 ⎟⎥
⎠⎦ (4)
3 σ

The Lode angle can be normalized by:

6θ
θ=1− (5)
π
The mathematical form of BWM is as follows [34]:
( ) 2
εf (η, θ) = εtf − εsf · θ + εsf (6)

where εtf and εsf are the boundary functions for axial symmetry tension and plane strain stress states, respectively. These two functions
are given by:

εtf = D1 e− D2 η
εsf = D3 e− D4 η
(7)

where D1 and D3 are the parameters defining the magnitude of the fracture locus. D2 and D4 are the parameters determining the
decreasing rate of the fracture ductility with the increase of stress triaxiality. The applicability of Bai-Wierzbicki model to fracture
prediction of structural steels has been verified by authors in Ref. [33].
In order to calibrate the above ductile fracture model, the evolutions of stress states and equivalent plastic strain (PEEQ) at the
fracture initiation locations of steel should be quantified. Therefore, tensile tests on four types of specimens, namely, cylindrical
smooth (CS) specimen, cylindrical notched (CN) specimen, flat grooved (FG) specimen and tension shear (TS) specimen have been
conducted by Zhong et al. [35]. In the loading process, it was found that with the increasing of PEEQ, the stress triaxiality changed
continuously while the Lode angle remained to be steady. The average values of the stress triaxiality ηAVG and Lode angle θAVG can be
calculated by:

∫εf
1
ηAVG = ηdε (8)
εf
0

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

∫εf
1
θAVG = θdε (9)
εf
0

where εf is the initiation fracture plastic strain. The results of ηAVG , θAVG and εf for all specimens are listed in Table 1. The values of D1,
D2, D3 and D4 can be obtained, which are 1.5512, 0.6227, 0.8802 and 0.3957, respectively. The corresponding fracture surface is
shown in Fig. 2. For application of the fracture model, a damage index is defined to represent the fracture ductility degradation of steel:

∫ε
dε
D(ε) = (10)
εf (η, θ)
0

The element will be removed from the mesh and crack initiates when the damage index D reaches one. The above BWM fracture
model of steel can be implemented in the ABAQUS via user subroutine.

3. Numerical model and validation

3.1. Model simplification
To save computational cost, the original steel frame is simplified into a beam-column substructure, as shown in Fig. 3. When
column B is removed from the structure, the beams AB and BC are extracted and the restraints from neighboring beams, columns and
braces of the structure are considered by using axial and rotational springs, with stiffness of KA and Kr, respectively. The transverse
beams BD and BE are not considered in the simplified model. This is because Khandelwal and El-Tawil [24] have discovered that the
existence of transverse beams has limited effect (with error about 5%) on the critical collapse displacement of the substructure. In the
following sections, the critical collapse displacement of the original structure is studied by using the simplified beam-column
substructure.

3.2. Establishment of the numerical model

The numerical analyses are conducted by using finite element software ABAQUS [36]. Q235 steel is used for both the steel beam
and column. The material properties are taken from those measured in the tests by the authors [37]. The material properties are
presented in Table 2. The true stress-strain relationship of the Q235 steel is shown in Fig. 4. Note that there is no special consideration
for the modelling of welds. The material property of the weld is designated to be the same to that of the steel beam. This is due to the
following consideration. In practical engineering, it is required that the capacity of the welded connection should be greater than that
of the beam. It is convenient and conservative to assume that the weld and steel beam have the same material properties. To accurately
obtain the critical collapse displacement of the steel beam, the ductile damage model is used, in which the effects of both stress
triaxiality and Lode angle on the fracture strain of steel are considered by a user-defined subroutine.
The hybrid modelling technique is used for the beam, as shown in Fig. 5. For the region close to the column-removal location, the
reduced four-node shell element (S4R) is used, while for other regions, the two-node beam element (B31) is used. The material
nonlinearities of the steel beam are considered for both the shell element region and beam element region. The steel column is
modelled by four-node shell element (S4R). The steel beam and column are connected by using “Merge” command to simulate fully
welded connection. The beam element and shell element are connected by using “Coupling” command. The mesh size of the model and
its reliability will be presented in Section 4. For the steel beams, the region with shell element is divided into two parts with different
mesh sizes. The regions close to the column-removal location have fine mesh while other regions have relatively coarse mesh. In the
numerical analyses, displacement-controlled loading is gradually applied at the column top. Dynamic explicit analysis is adopted to
more accurately and easily obtain the critical collapse displacement of the beam. The axial and rotational restraints at the beam ends
are considered by using linear translational and rotational springs, respectively.

3.3. Validation of the numerical analysis

A static collapse test on a steel sub-frame by Qiao et al. [38] is used to validate the reliability of the numerical analysis. The details
of the specimen and test setup are shown in Fig. 6. The section dimensions of the steel beam and column are H200 × 100 × 5.5 × 8 and
H250 × 250 × 9 × 14, respectively. The length of the double-span beam is 3040 mm. The two ends of the beam are connected to the
reaction platforms by rollers. The materials for the steel beams and columns are both Q235B. The beams are welded to the column by

Table 1
Summary of stress indexes and fracture plastic strain [35].

Specimen ηAVG θAVG εf Specimen ηAVG θAVG εf

CS 0.529 1.000 1.161 FG-3 1.108 0 0.479
CN-1 0.749 1.000 0.989 TP-1 0.022 0.055 0.842
CN-2 0.958 1.000 0.868 TP-2 0.378 0.754 0.885
CN-3 1.190 1.000 0.698 TP-3 0.404 0.694 0.969
FG-1 0.678 0 0.785 TP-4 0.450 0.620 1.007
FG-2 0.762 0 0.654

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Fig. 2. Three-dimensional fracture surface of Q235 steel [35].

Fig. 3. Simplification of the original structure.

Table 2
Material properties of members in the numerical model [37].

Material E1 (×105 MPa) f2y (MPa) f3u (MPa) (%)

Q235 2.1 235 455 20.4

1 2 3 4
Note: Elastic modulus. Yield strength. Ultimate tensile strength. Ultimate tensile strain.

E4303 welding metal. More details were given in Ref. [38].

In the numerical analysis, the material properties of the steel beam and column are the same with those in the test. In the regions
near the column-removal location, the beams and columns are modelled by shell element, with mesh size of 5 mm (40 elements along
the depth of the beam). For other regions, the beams are modelled by beam elements, with mesh size of 25 mm (44 elements for each
beam). The final deformation shape, resistance-displacement relationship and failure mode of the sub-frame from the numerical
analyses are compared with those from the experiment, as shown in Fig. 7, Fig. 8 and Fig. 9, respectively. It can be seen from Fig. 7 that
the numerical analysis can generally capture the main characteristics of the resistance-displacement relationship of the sub-frame
during the column-removal process. The numerical collapse displacement is about 225 mm, which is 5% less than the test result of
237 mm. Fig. 9 suggests that the numerical analysis can accurately predict the fracture location of the steel beam. Therefore, the
reliability of the numerical analyses can be validated.

4. Relationship of critical collapse displacement with span and depth

4.1. Description
To study the effects of the span and depth of the beam on its critical collapse displacement, five I-shaped sections for the steel beam
are selected from the Chinese code Hot Rolled H and Cut T Section Steel [39]. For each section, six values of span-to-depth ratio are
considered. The section dimensions of the beam and column are summarized in Table 3. Note that the span of the beam refers to that

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Fig. 4. Stress-strain relationship of Q235 steel.

Fig. 5. Details of the numerical model.

Fig. 6. Details of the test on specimen RBS1 by Qiao et al. [38].

before the column is removed. The notations of the substructures are organized as follows: H (depth)-L (span). For example, H200-L4
refers to that the depth of the beam is 200 mm and its span before the column is removed is 4 m. The range of the beam depth is from
200 mm to 800 mm. The span-to-depth ratio of the beam ranges from 10 to 20. Considering that this section only studies the effects of
the span and section depth, the boundary conditions of the beam are designated to be fixed in the numerical analyses. The
resistance-displacement curves for each substructure during the column-removal process will be presented and the relationship of the
critical collapse displacement with the span and depth of the beam will also be analyzed.

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Fig. 7. Comparison of the resistance-displacement of the sub-frame.

Fig. 8. Comparison of the deformation shape of the sub-frame.

Fig. 9. Comparison of the failure mode of the sub-frame.

4.2. Mesh size

The effects of the mesh size on the collapse displacement of the steel beam are evaluated before conducting the parametric analyses.
The mesh size sensitivity analysis is performed on the substructure H200-L4. Five different mesh sizes are considered. The details of the
mesh size are shown in Table 4 and Fig. 10. The mesh size of the beam element for all cases is 25 mm. For the shell element, the global
mesh means that the mesh size along the longitudinal direction and at the section of the beam is the same. For the region with fine
mesh, the mesh size decreases from 25 mm to 2.5 mm and the element number at the beam depth correspondingly increases from 8 to

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Table 3
Section dimensions of the beam and column.

Notation Beam section dimension (mm) Column section dimension (mm) Span (m) Span-to-depth ratio

H200-L4 200 × 100 × 5.5 × 8 400 × 400 × 13 × 21 4 20

H200-L3.6 3.6 18
H200-L3.2 3.2 16
H200-L2.8 2.8 14
H200-L2.4 2.4 12
H200-L2 2 10
H400-L8 400 × 200 × 8 × 13 400 × 400 × 13 × 21 8 20
H400-L7.2 7.2 18
H400-L6.4 6.4 16
H400-L5.6 5.6 14
H400-L4.8 4.8 12
H400-L4 4 10
H500-L10 500 × 200 × 10 × 16 500 × 500 × 15 × 25 10 20
H500-L9 9 18
H500-L8 8 16
H500-L7 7 14
H500-L6 6 12
H500-L5 5 10
H600-L12 600 × 200 × 11 × 17 600 × 600 × 20 × 30 12 20
H600-L10.8 10.8 18
H600-L9.6 9.6 16
H600-L8.4 8.4 14
H600-L7.2 7.2 12
H600-L6 6 10
H800-L16 800 × 300 × 14 × 26 800 × 800 × 28 × 40 16 20
H800-L14.4 14.4 18
H800-L12.8 12.8 16
H800-L11.2 11.2 14
H800-L9.6 9.6 12
H800-L8 8 10

Table 4
Different mesh sizes for substructure H200-L4 in the sensitivity analysis.

Case Beam element (mm) Shell element (mm)

Coarse region Fine region

M1 25 25 (global) 25 (global)
M2 25 25 (global) 25 (Axial direction)
10 (In section)
M3 25 25 (Axial direction) 5 (global)
10 (In section)
M4 25 25 (Axial direction) 5 (Axial direction)
10 (In section) 3.33 (In section)
M5 25 25 (Axial direction) 5 (Axial direction)
10 (In section) 2.5 (In section)

80. The critical collapse displacements of the substructure H200-L4 in these five cases will be compared and an appropriate mesh size
considering both calculation efficiency and accuracy will be given for further parametric analyses.
The effect of mesh size on the resistance-displacement curves of the substructures M1-M5 is presented in Fig. 11. The collapse of all
substructures is due to the fracture of the steel beam near the column-removal location, shown in Fig. 12. It can be seen from Fig. 11
that the resistance-displacement curves for substructures M1-M5 are almost identical before the final collapse state. By comparing the
critical collapse displacements for cases M1-M3, it is found that the mesh size has significant effect on the critical collapse displacement
of the substructure. When the mesh size decreases, the critical collapse displacement of the substructure decreases. However, the
critical collapse displacements for cases M3-M5 are almost the same. It indicates that the mesh size of case M3 is sufficiently fine and
this mesh size can be used in the following parametric analyses for substructure with beam depth of 200 mm. Table 5 presents the
details of the mesh size for all substructures. It should be noted that the mesh sizes of substructures with beam depth of 400 mm, 500
mm, 600 mm and 800 mm are scaled from that of substructure with beam depth of 200 mm, based on the beam depth ratio. In other
words, the element number along the depth direction of the beam at the fine mesh region is remained to be 40 for all substructures.

4.3. Results
From Table 3, it can be seen that the widths of the five I-shaped section are different. Therefore, before establish the relationship of
the critical collapse displacement with the depth and span of the steel beam, the potential effect of the section width should be studied.
The section width of the substructure H200-L4 is changed from 100 mm to 200 mm to see the difference of the critical collapse

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Fig. 10. Mesh of the shell element of substructure H200-L4.

Fig. 11. Effect of mesh size on the resistance-displacement curve of the substructure.

Fig. 12. Collapse of the substructure.

displacement due to this change. Fig. 13 shows the comparisons of the resistance-displacement relationship of the substructure with
different section widths. It is found that the collapse resistance of the substructure with larger section width is greater than that with
smaller width, however, the critical collapse displacement of these two substructures are almost the same. For the substructure with
section width of 100 mm and 200 mm, the critical collapse displacement is 0.86 m and 0.82 m, respectively. The difference is within
5%. This is mainly because the steel beam is a two-dimensional load-bearing member. Therefore, the effect of the section width on the
critical collapse displacement of the beam can be neglected and the difference of the collapse displacement of the substructures can be
considered to be caused only by the difference of the section depth and span of the beam.

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Table 5
Details of the mesh for all substructures.

No. Length of beam element Length of shell element with fine mesh Mesh size
(m) (mm)
Beam element Shell element (mm)
(mm)
Fine region Coarse region

H200-L4 3 150 25 5 (global) 25 (Axial direction) 10 (In

H200-L3.6 2.6 section)
H200-L3.2 2.2
H200-L2.8 1.8
H200-L2.4 1.4
H200-L2 1
H400-L8 6 300 50 10 (global) 50 (Axial direction) 20 (In
H400-L7.2 5.2 section)
H400-L6.4 4.4
H400-L5.6 3.6
H400-L4.8 2.8
H400-L4 2
H500-L10 7.5 375 62.5 12.5 62.5 (Axial direction) 25 (In
H500-L9 6.5 (global) section)
H500-L8 5.5
H500-L7 4.5
H500-L6 3.5
H500-L5 2.5
H600-L12 9 450 75 15 (global) 75 (Axial direction) 30 (In
H600- 7.8 section)
L10.8
H600-L9.6 6.6
H600-L8.4 5.4
H600-L7.2 4.2
H600-L6 3
H800-L16 12 600 100 20 (global) 100 (Axial direction) 40 (In
H800- 10.4 section)
L14.4
H800- 8.8
L12.8
H800- 7.2
L11.2
H800-L9.6 5.6
H800-L8 4

Fig. 13. Effect of the section width on the critical collapse displacement of the substructure H200-L4.

The resistance-displacement curves for all substructures are shown in Fig. 14. It can be seen that the resistance of the substructure
greatly re-ascends at large deformation stage. The ultimate bearing capacity of the substructure is about 3–6 times of its plastic bearing
capacity. This is because the resistance mechanism of the substructure changes from bending action to tensile action. Hence for the
substructure with same beam section, the ultimate bearing capacity of the substructure is almost the same. However, when the span of
the beam decreases, the critical collapse displacement of the substructure decreases while the plastic bearing capacity of the sub­
structure increases. For a same beam span, with the increase of the beam depth, the ultimate bearing capacity of the substructure
increases while the collapse displacement of the substructure decreases. The critical collapse displacement is plotted against the span-
to-depth ratio of the beam to further study the effects of the beam depth and span of the beam, as shown in Fig. 15. It is found that for

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Fig. 14. Resistance-displacement curves for all substructures.

Fig. 15. Relationship of the critical collapse displacement and the span-to-depth ratio of the beam.

each section, the critical collapse displacement of the beam is almost linear against its span-to-depth ratio. With the increase of the
span-to-depth ratio, the critical collapse displacement of the beam increases. The relationship between the critical collapse
displacement with span and depth of the beam will be given in Section 6.

5. Boundary conditions
5.1. Description
The effects of rotational and axial restraints on the critical collapse displacement of the beam are studied in this section. The axial
and rotational restraints are considered by using linear translational and rotational springs, respectively. It should be noted that the

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linear assumption may underestimate the critical collapse displacement of the beam because it ignores the potential degradation of the
stiffness of the neighboring structural components at large deformation. However, it brings great convenience to the numerical an­
alyses and qualification of the critical collapse displacement of the beam. The reasonability of this assumption is validated in Section 7.
Six values of the elastic stiffness ratio of the spring to the beam are considered, 0.01, 0.05, 0.1, 0.5, 1 and 10. The elastic axial stiffness
KA and rotational stiffness KR of the steel beam are given by:
EA
KA = (11)
L

EI
KR = 4 (12)
L

wherein E is the Young’s modulus of the steel; L is the span of the beam before the column is removed; A and I are the section area and
section moment of inertia, respectively.
The substructure H400-L4 is used for the parametric analyses of the boundary condition effect. By substituting the parameters into
Equations.(11) and (12), the stiffness of the beam for the substructure H400-L4 can be obtained. Hence the values of the translational
and rotational springs can be calculated. Table 6 summarizes the stiffness of the translational and rotational spring in the numerical
analyses. A total of 36 cases are considered, in which the range of the axial stiffness ratio and rotational stiffness ratio both range from
0.001 to 10. In the notations of each case, AR001-RR005 indicates that the axial stiffness ratio is 0.01 and the rotational stiffness ratio is
0.05.

5.2. Results
Fig. 16 presents the comparisons of the resistance-displacement relationships of the substructure with different boundary condi­
tions. The substructures with partial boundary conditions have a larger critical collapse displacement compared with that with fully
restraints (the critical collapse displacement of the substructure H400-L4 with fully restraints is 0.846 m). From Fig. 16 (a) or (b) (AR is
a constant), it can be seen that the rotational restraint mainly affects the transition stage of the resistance-displacement curve of the
beam. A greater rotational restraint of the beam results in a larger resistance of the beam. Moreover, the effect of the rotational

Table 6
Stiffness of the translational and rotational spring.

Notation Axial stiffness ratio Axial stiffness (N/m) Rotational stiffness ratio Rotational stiffness (Nm)

AR001-RR001 0.01 4332180 0.01 488220

AR001-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR001-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR001-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR001-RR1 1 48822000
AR001-RR10 10 488220000
AR005-RR001 0.05 21660900 0.01 488220
AR005-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR005-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR005-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR005-RR1 1 48822000
AR005-RR10 10 488220000
AR01-RR001 0.1 43321800 0.01 488220
AR01-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR01-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR01-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR01-RR1 1 48822000
AR01-RR10 10 488220000
AR05-RR001 0.5 216609000 0.01 488220
AR05-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR05-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR05-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR05-RR1 1 48822000
AR05-RR10 10 488220000
AR1-RR001 1 433218000 0.01 488220
AR1-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR1-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR1-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR1-RR1 1 48822000
AR1-RR10 10 488220000
AR10-RR001 10 4332180000 0.01 488220
AR10-RR005 0.05 2441100
AR10-RR01 0.1 4882200
AR10-RR05 0.5 24411000
AR10-RR1 1 48822000
AR10-RR10 10 488220000

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Fig. 16. Resistance-displacement curves of the substructure with different boundary conditions.

restraint on the critical collapse displacement of the beam becomes less significant when the axial restraint increases. For example,
when AR = 0.5, the critical collapse displacements of the beam of all the substructures in Fig. 16 (b) are the same. While from Fig. 16
(c) or (d) (RR is a constant), it can be seen that the axial restraint mainly affects the resistance-displacement relationship of the beam at
large deformation stage. The axial restraint has significant effect on the critical collapse displacement of the beam. This phenomenon is
independent of the values of the rotational restraint of the beam. When the axial restraint is greater than 0.5, the resistance-
displacements of the substructures are almost the same (AR05-RR001, AR1-RR001 and AR10-RR001 in Fig. 16 (c), and AR05-
RR05, AR1-RR05 and AR10-RR05 in Fig. 16 (d)).
To more explicitly show the effect of boundary condition on the critical collapse displacement of the beam, an increase factor of the
critical collapse displacement λ is defined, which is given by:
up
λ= (13)
uf

wherein up is the critical collapse displacement of the substructure with partial boundary conditions. uf is the critical collapse

Fig. 17. Summary of the increase factor of the critical collapse displacement.

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

displacement of the substructure with full boundary conditions.

Fig. 17 summarizes the increase factor of the critical collapse displacement for the substructures with rotational restraint ratio from
0.01 to 1. The maximum value of the increase factor is about 1.5, when the AR and RR are both 0.01. It can be seen that the increase
factor-rotational restraint ratio curve for substructures with axial restraint ratio of 0.5, 1 and 10 are coincident. When the rotational
restraint ratio increases, its effect on the increase factor of the critical collapse displacement becomes less obvious. Moreover, the effect
of the rotational restraint ratio on the critical collapse displacement of the substructure is significant only when the axial restraint ratio
is 0.01.

6. Quantification of critical collapse displacement

The relationship of the collapse displacement with the depth and span of the beam with fully boundary conditions are firstly
determined. Based on the results from Section 4, a regression of the critical collapse displacement against the depth and span of the
beam can be made. The critical collapse displacement is converted into a non-dimensional form:
/
UDR = uf D (14)

wherein uf is the critical collapse displacement; D is the depth of the beam.

The relationship between the UDR and the span-to-depth ratio is shown in Fig. 18. The x-axis SDR refers to the span-to-depth ratio.
It can be seen that the relationship between the UDR and SDR is almost linear. Fig. 19 shows the regression of the UDR against the SDR
of the beam. The equation of the regressed straight line is given by:
UDR = 0.2278 × SDR − 0.2478 (15)
The R-square factor of the regression is 0.9941. It can be seen that the results of the finite element analyses are basically on the
regressed straight line. Note that this equation is only applicable to the steel frame with Q235 steel. This is because the values of the
parameters in the fracture model for Q235 steel are adopted in the numerical analyses.
It is concluded from Section 5 that the critical collapse displacement for the substructure with partial boundary conditions is greater
than that with full boundary condition. Therefore, the increase factor is used to modify the critical collapse displacement of the
substructure with full boundary condition. Considering that the effect of the rotational restraint ratio on the critical collapse
displacement of the substructure is significant only when the axial restraint ratio is 0.01 and in practical engineering, the axial restraint
from neighboring substructures will be greater than this value, the effect of the rotational restraint on the critical collapse displacement
of the substructure can be neglected. Therefore, the difference of the critical collapse displacement of the substructure can be
considered to be caused only by the axial restraint ratio. To be conservative, for a certain axial restraint ratio, the value of the critical
collapse displacement for the rotational restraint ratio of 10 is selected. The relationship of the increase factor of the axial restraint
ratio is shown in Fig. 20. Note that the increase factor is shown only when AR is between 0.001 and 0.5. This is because when AR is
greater than 0.5, the value of the increase factor is 1.
The regression of the increase factor of the critical collapse displacement against the axial restraint ratio is shown in Fig. 21. A
power function is used to capture the main characteristic of the curve, which is given by:
{
0.9239AR− 0.069 AR < 0.5
λ= (16)
1 AR ≥ 0.5

Note that the value of the increase factor λ should be no less than 1.0. When AR is greater than 0.5, the value of the increase factor λ
can be directly designated as 1.0.
Hence, the critical collapse displacement of the beam with partial boundary conditions is calculated by:
up = λuf (17)

Fig. 18. Relationship of the UDR and SDR

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Fig. 19. Regression of the UDR and SDR

Fig. 20. Relationship of the increase factor with the axial restraint ratio.

Fig. 21. Regression of the increase factor against axial restraint ratio.

wherein uf and λ are determined by Equations.(15) and (16).

7. Validation
To validate the accuracy of the proposed formulae for the critical collapse displacement in Section 6, the results from the collapse
test on a four-bay steel frame [30] was used. As shown in Fig. 22(a), the vertical load is quasi-statically applied at the middle-column
location of the frame. The beams and columns are connected by fully welding. Q235 steel is used for both the beams and the columns.
The dimensions of the beams and columns are presented in Table 7. More information can be found in Ref. [30]. The load-displacement
curve of the frame during the loading process is shown in Fig. 22(b). The resistance of the frame decreased dramatically when the
displacement reached about 450 mm (critical collapse displacement), due to the fracture at the lower flange of the steel beam.
From Fig. 22(a), it can be seen that the axial restraints of the steel beam are provided by the steel columns. Therefore, the axial
stiffness at the boundary of the beam equals to the lateral stiffness of the column. For each column, the lateral stiffness LS can be
calculated by:

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Fig. 22. Collapse test on a four-bay steel frame [30].

Table 7
Dimensions of the beam and column.

Column height Column section Beam span Beam section

1100 H200 × 200 × 8 × 12 2000 H200 × 100 × 5.5 × 8

Note: Dimension in mm.

EI
LS = 12 (18)
H3

wherein I and H are the section inertia and height of the column, respectively.
Considering that there are two columns at both sides of the beam, the axial stiffness of the beam AS is given by:
EI
AS = 24 (19)
H3
The axial stiffness ratio AR is hence obtained:
IL
AR = 24 (20)
AH 3

wherein A and L are the section area and span of the beam, respectively.
By substituting the values of the parameters into Equation (20), the axial stiffness ratio AR can be obtained, which is 0.63. From
Section 5, it is found that when AR is greater than 0.5, the value of the increase factor of the critical collapse displacement λ in Equation
(17) is 1.0. Therefore, the critical collapse displacement of the frame can be determined only by Equation (15). By substituting the
values of the span and depth of the beam into Equation (15), the critical collapse displacement can be obtained, which is about 406
mm. This predicted value is about 10% less than the experimental value. This is because at large deformation stage, the column will
undergo plastic deformation and hence result in the degradation of the lateral stiffness. Therefore, by using the elastic stiffness of the
boundary restraints, the predicted critical collapse displacement will always be conservative on the safe side.

8. Conclusion
This paper studied the critical collapse displacement of steel frames due to an interior column loss. A design-based quantification of
the critical collapse displacement of steel frames with considerations of the effects of the depth, span, axial restraint and rotational
restraint of the beam was conducted. The reliability of the proposed method is validated against the test result. The following con­
clusions can be drawn:
● The ratio of the critical collapse displacement to the depth of the beam is a linear function of the span-to-depth ratio. A larger span-
to-depth ratio results in a greater critical collapse displacement of the beam.
● The rotational restraint of the beam mainly affects the transition stage of the resistance-displacement curve of the beam while the
axial restraint mainly affects the catenary stage of the beam.
● The rotational restraint of the beam has limited effect on the critical collapse displacement of the beam. When the axial restraint
ratio of the beam exceeds 0.01, the effect of the rotational restraint on the critical collapse displacement of the beam can be
neglected.

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J.-Z. Zhang et al. Journal of Building Engineering 54 (2022) 104664

Author statement
Jing-Zhou Zhang: Investigation, Visualization, Writing - Original Draft. Guo-Qiang Li: Supervision, Writing - Review. Yuan-Zuo
Wang: Investigation, Writing - Original Draft, Project administration. Hui Li: Writing - Review.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgements
Financial supports by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Beijing Postdoctoral Research Foundation are greatly
acknowledged.

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