Study on Flexural Behaviour of Box Section Bamboo-Steel Composite Beams

Abstract

To take full advantages of the bamboo and cold-formed thin-walled steel, a new type of box section beam combined with bamboo and steel channel was proposed in this paper. Five composite beams with different parameters were tested to evaluate the effects of bamboo plywood thickness of composite beams and thickness and sectional dimension of steel channel. The results of experiment showed that the proposed composite beams exhibited excellent flexural bearing capacities and stiffness. The increase of bamboo plywood thickness and sectional dimension of steel channel could improve bearing capacity and flexural stiffness of composite beams, while the increase of steel thickness could enhance the bearing capacity and safety margin of composite beams. Furthermore, a new method to predict the deformation and bearing capacities of composite beams was proposed and matched well with the experimental results.