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Procedia Engineering00 (2017) 000–000
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Procedia Engineering 210 (2017) 544–550

6th International Workshop on Performance, Protection & Strengthening of Structures under

Extreme Loading, PROTECT2017, 11-12 December 2017, Guangzhou (Canton), China

An approach for evaluating fire resistance of steel beams

considering creep effect
Weiyong Wanga,b一, Linbo Zhanga
一

a
College of Civil Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400045, China
b
Key Laboratory of New Technology for Construction of Cities in Mountain Area (Ministry of Education),
Key
Chongqing University, Chongqing 400045, China

Abstract

Most of previous studies on fire resistance of restrained steel beams neglected creep effect due to lack of suitable creep model.
This paper presents a finite element model (FEM) for accessing the fire resistance of restrained high strength Q460 steel beams
by taking high temperature Norton creep model of steel into consideration. The validation of the established model is verified by
comparing the axial force and deflection of restrained beams obtained by finite element analysis with test results. In order to
explore the creep effect on fire response of restrained Q460 steel beams, the thermal axial force and deflection of the beams are
also analyzed excluding creep effect. Results from comparison infer that creep plays a crucial role in fire response of restrained
steel beam and neglecting the effect of creep may leads to unsafe design. A simplified design approach to determine the moment
capacity of restrained Q460 steel beams is proposed based on the results of parametric studies by considering creep effect.
© 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
© 2017 The Authors.
Peer-review Published byofElsevier
under responsibility Ltd. committee of the 6th International Workshop on Performance, Protection &
the scientific
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 6th International Workshop on Performance, Protection &
Strengthening of Structures under Extreme Loading.
Strengthening of Structures under Extreme Loading
Keywords: Fire resistance; creep; restrained beams; high strength steel; simplified approach

1. Introduction

The fire response of steel beams has been extensively studied in the last years [1], while the majority of them
have been performed on isolated steel members. Realistic beams are generally under axial and rotational restraint by
the surrounding structures, which influence its fire behavior, resulting in considerable difference between reality and

Corresponding author. Tel.: + 15086885068

一
一

E-mail address: wywang@cqu.edu.cn

1877-7058 © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Peer-review under responsibility ofthe scientific committee of the 6th International Workshop on Performance, Protection & Strengthening of
Structures under Extreme Loading.

1877-7058 © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 6th International Workshop on Performance, Protection &
Strengthening of Structures under Extreme Loading.
10.1016/j.proeng.2017.11.112
 Weiyong Wang et al. / Procedia Engineering 210 (2017) 544–550 545
2 Weiyong Wang/ Procedia Engineering00 (2017) 000–000

previous studies. More and more studies and experiments on restrained members under fire conditions have been
carried out recently. Liu et al. [2] tested the behavior of axially restrained steel beam in fire, considering non-
uniform temperature distribution in beam section. The test revealed the effect of axial restraint on catenary action,
which may be able to prevent the beam’s deflection from running-away at high temperature. Li and Guo [3]
investigated the response of two restrained steel beams during heating and cooling phases. The consequence showed
that fire performance of restrained steel beams is superior to that of isolated beams and the stiffness of axial restraint
has significant effect on response of restrained steel beams in heating and cooling process.
High strength steels have been extensively applied in modern engineering applications in China due to its higher
strength and strength to weight ratio. One such widely used high strength steel type is Q460 steel, similar to ASTM
A575 Gr65 steel in North America. The mechanical properties of high strength Q460 steel has distinctive
degradation way at high temperature compared to mild steel due to different chemical composition and fabrication
process. Wang et al. [4] performed tension testing on high strength Q460 steel in various high temperatures and
obtained yield strength and elastic modulus as a function of temperature. In comparison to mild steel, it was shown
that high strength Q460 steel has slower reduction of strength and stiffness in temperature range of 20~800℃.
In exposure to certain level of stress, even far below the yield stress, the steel structure can develop slowly and
permanent deformation. This phenomenon is referred to creep and will be severe when subjected to high temperature
for a long time, which may lead to premature failure without proper consideration in fire resistance design. Therefore,
the influence of creep under fire conditions has been a focus emphasized by many researchers. Tan et al. [5]
proposed a finite element program, considering both geometric and material nonlinearities, and a creep model, which
can precisely predict the collapse load and critical temperature of steel frame in various conditions. It was shown that
creep became dominant beyond 400 ℃ . A series of numerical studies conducted by Kodur and Dwaikat [6-7]
indicated that the impact of creep in high temperature on the fire resistance behavior of restrained mild steel beams is
considerable and there is a better agreement between experimental results and analysis accounting for creep effects.
The current fire design codes, which mainly based on isolated mild steel beams, have not proposed effective
method to evaluate fire performance of restrained high strength steel beams, let alone taking creep effect at high
temperature into consideration. A comprehensive study was carried out by Wang et al. [8] on the high temperature
creep strain in high strength Q460 steel and a corresponding constitutive creep model was presented. There is still a
challenge in incorporating Q460 creep strain into fire resistance design due to lack of understanding of creep effect
and practical design approach that can predict the fire response of restrained Q460 steel structures in fire. To
overcome this knowledge gap, a numerical investigation was carried out and an approach is presented for evaluating
fire resistance of restrained Q460 steel beams by employing the creep effect. The novelty of the current method lies
in not only taking creep effect into consideration, but also simplicity and convenience.

2. Material properties of Q460 steel at elevated temperatures

2.1. Mechanical properties

There are huge differences of the reduction factor of mechanical properties between high strength Q460 steels
and mild steels at elevated temperatures in consideration of the chemical compositions and fabrication process of
high strength Q460 steels varying from those of conventional steels. Therefore, the proposed equations derived by
Liu et al. [9] are selected to determine the yield strength and elastic modulus reduction factors of Q460 steel for a
given exposed temperature.

 f yT f y   (T )  5.59  1014 T 5  1.38  1010 T 4  1.21 107 T 3

 (1)
  4.18  105 T 2  4.67  103 T  1.07 20C  T  800C
 9 3 7 2 4
 ET E   (T )  1.38  10 T  7.4  10 T  3.69  10 T  1.01
546 Weiyong Wang et al. / Procedia Engineering 210 (2017) 544–550
Weiyong Wang/ Procedia Engineering 00 (2017) 000–000 3

where fyT is the yield strength of high strength Q460 steel at temperature T; fy is the yield strength of high strength
Q460 steel at room temperature (20℃); ET is the elastic modulus of high strength Q460 steel at temperature T; E is
the elastic modulus of high strength Q460 steel at room temperature.
Poisson's ratio  is adopted as 0.3 without considering the temperature effect since it is almost keep constant at
elevated temperatures. The stress-strain relationship of Q460 steel is determined with equations proposed by Poh
[10].

2.2. Creep model

Currently creep deformation, in most structural fire resistance analysis, is modeled either using Harmathy creep
model [10], or ANSYS creep models [5], or Fields and Fields creep model [12]. Because of lack of creep test data,
the commonly employed creep models were developed based on creep tests on Australian A149 steel or ASTM-A36
structural steel. Due to the complexity of creep and steel type dependent, it is difficult to apply existing creep model
and corresponding coefficients to different steels. A series of creep tests on Q460 steels were performed by Wang et
al. [8] and one creep model based on the creep power law was proposed for Q460 steels. This creep model is also
employed by ANSYS software package and is called Norton creep model. This creep model can be written as:

cr  d1 d e d /T
2 3
(2)

where cr is creep strain rate; d1, d2 and d3 are non-dimensional coefficients related to corresponding steel type
and for Q460 steel, d1=2.8186 ×10-11, d2=1.42, d3=11890; T is the temperature of steel (in K) and  is stress in
steel (in Pa).

3. Finite element modeling and validation

To investigate the fire response of restrained steel beams, the finite element software ANSYS is adopted, which
is adequate of solving thermal gradients and high non-linear structural problems.

3.1. Finite element model

A typical Q460 steel beam with axial and rotational restraint (shown in Fig.1) is established in ANSYS. A
uniform distributed load is applied on the beam. SHELL181 element, used to model the steel beam, has four nodes
with six degrees of freedom (three translations and three rotations) per node. This element is applicable for large
strain and can account for creep effect at elevated temperatures. COMBIN14 element was chose to simulate the
rotational and axial restraint at two ends of the beam. The NLGEOM is set on to deal with the geometric nonlinear
analysis because large displacement occurs in restrained steel beam at high temperature. In order to simplify the
analysis process, the temperatures in steel are calculated by increment method and the temperatures are applied as a
special load on column.

COMBIN14 q COMBIN14

SHELL181

Fig.1 Finite element model of restrained steel beam

Initial imperfections were incorporated into the beam for the buckling analysis. Modal analysis at ambient
temperature was made to gain the first buckling mode, which was scaled to that maximum displacement equals to
1‰ beam length, and the scaled deformation was used to update the geometry of the beam. Initial residual stresses
 Weiyong Wang et al. / Procedia Engineering 210 (2017) 544–550 547
4 Weiyong Wang/ Procedia Engineering00 (2017) 000–000

were also taken into account, and the maximum value of the initial residual stresses was adopted to be 30% of steel
yield stress at room temperature [13]. The values of initial residual stresses were assigned at relevant element
integration points.

3.2. Model validation

Data from fire tests on restrained steel beam conducted by Li and Guo [14] are choose for verifying the validation
of the established model. The fire tests were performed on two restrained steel beams of H250×250×8×12 section
with length of 4.5m and two-point loading of 130 kN were applied on both beams. The axial and rotational stiffness
of the beams are 39.54kN/mm and 1.09×108Nm/rad, respectively. The beams are made of Q235 steel (measured
average yield strength is 291MPa). However, the coefficients of Norton creep model derived from test data [8] are
based on Q460 steel (measured average yield strength is 492MPa). Study by Luecke et al. [15] indicated that stress
can be modified when calculating creep strain to accommodate the creep properties of restrained beams and the
coefficients for stress modification are ratios between yield strength in creep model and yield strength in calculation.
After this modification, creep strain decreases with higher yield strength under similar stress level. The expression
of creep model for Q235 steel can be written as:

492 d2  d3/T 492 d2 d2  d3/T

cr  d1 ( ) e  d1 ( )  e (3)
291 291

In the analysis, elastic modulus is 2.06×105 MPa and Poisson’s ratio is adopted as 0.3 at room temperature. The
value of thermal expansion coefficient is 1.4×10-5. Different with web and bottom flange, top flange can be seen as
3-sides fire exposure due to the protection of concrete slab connected top flange of beam. Because of large
dispersion in measured temperatures, the average temperatures of two components were employed for simplicity:
one is average value of measured temperatures of web and bottom flange and the other is average measured
temperature of top flange.

0.30

0.25

0.20

0.15
(m)

Test data
0.10 ANSYS (no creep)
ANSYS (creep)
0.05

0.00
0 400 800 1200 1600 2000 2400
t (s)

(a) Deflection (b) Axial force

Fig.2 Comparison of response of beam between prediction and test

In Fig. 2, predictions obtained from ANSYS considering creep effects are compared with test data. Results shown
in Fig. 2 indicate that the creep has significant influence on the fire response of beams, especially after 15min fire
exposure. Overall, predictions from the model reach a good agreement with test data when high-temperature creep is
incorporated in the analysis. When ignoring the creep effect, the calculated deflections and thermal induced axial
forces are smaller in the later stage of heating phase.
548 Weiyong Wang et al. / Procedia Engineering 210 (2017) 544–550
Weiyong Wang/ Procedia Engineering 00 (2017) 000–000 5

4. Design approach of fire resistance of restrained Q460 steel beams

The thermal axial force is generated and moment changes when the steel beam is exposed to fire. Thus, it is
difficult to predict the evolutions of axial force, moment and mid-span deflection at elevated temperature. In current
design codes (EC3 2005, CECS200: 2006) [16-17], simple approaches are provided but neglecting creep effect.
For simplicity, the critical temperature of restrained Q460 steel beams under fire condition could be taken as
critical temperature of restrained Q460 steel beam for fire design. To understanding the response of restrained high
strength Q460 steel beams in fire conditions including creep effect, the established finite element model was utilized
to carry out parametric studies on influencing factors, and which indicated that rotational restraint stiffness, span-
depth ratio, heating rate and temperature distribution play critical roles in determining fire resistance of restrained
Q460 steel beam. Using regression analysis, a simplified calculation method was developed accounting for these
factors as well as creep. The governing equation for fire resistance of restrained Q460 steel beam is:

M q  M pT (4)

where MpT is resistant moment of restrained Q460 steel beam, which can be calculated as:

M pT  LRf yWp (5)

r T 1a (6)
LR=
1  bk T 2 (Tcr  T0 )c

k  0.00765(l / h) 2  0.224(l / h)  2.42 (7)

where Mq equals to ql2/8; Wp is plastic section modulus；βr and T0 are coefficients related to rotational restraint
stiffness ratio (γ), presented in Table 1; βT1 and βT2 are coefficients related to temperature distribution pattern, which
are both 1.0 for uniformly temperature distribution pattern and 1.05 and 1.65 for non-uniform temperature
distribution pattern, respectively; l/h is the span-depth ratio of beam; a, b and c are coefficients related to di/λi,
presented in Table 2. The explicit limitations for the proposed calculation method are as follows: (1) The fire curve
is follows as ISO 834 standard fire; (2) The value of di/λi is lower than 0.2m2℃/W; (3) The critical temperature Tcr is
within the range of 500℃~800℃; (4) No lateral buckling occurs in beams.

Table.1. The value of βr and T0

γ 0 0.1 0.3 1 >5
βr 0.636 0.64 0.726 1 1.12
T0 103 68.2 29.6 0 -5.6

Table.2. The value of a b and c

di/λi(m2℃/W) 0 0.05 0.1 0.2
a 1.53 1.76 1.82 1.88
b 1.7×10-28 4.18×10-25 2.26×10-24 6×10-24
c 9.82 8.72 8.5 8.4
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Fig.3 Comparison of critical temperature between simplified approach and ANSYS

Under a predefined applied load, the critical temperature could be calculated by:

1
 1  r T 1a  c
Tcr     1  T0 (8)
 bk T 2  LR 

Critical temperatures for a large number of restrained Q460 steel beams with various load levels, different
rotational restraint, span-depth ratio and heating rate, are predicted by ANSYS and the proposed approach and the
comparison are plotted in Fig.3. Good agreement is found and the difference between them is within 5%.

5. Conclusion

Based on the analysis of restrained high strength Q460 steel beam presented in this paper, the following
conclusions can be drawn:
 Creep has notable influence on fire behavior of restrained Q460 steel beams and neglecting the creep effect could
lead to an unsafe design.
 The proposed simplified design method is capable of predicting the critical temperature of restrained Q460 steel
beams.

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to acknowledge the support from the Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.:
51678090). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this paper are those of the
authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsors.

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