Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

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Thin-Walled Structures
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tws

Full length article

Study of buckling-restrained braces with concrete infilled GFRP tubes T

a,b a,b,⁎ a,b a,b
Hongpeng Sun , Mingming Jia , Sumei Zhang , Yuyin Wang
a
Key Lab of Structures Dynamic Behaviour and Control of the Ministry of Education (Harbin Institute of Technology), Harbin 150090, China
b
School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150090, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: In the proposed buckling-restrained brace (BRB), a concrete infilled glass-fibre reinforced polymer (GFRP) tube
Buckling restrained brace is used instead of a conventional concrete infilled steel tube to restrict steel inner core buckling. It has the
GFRP following advantages: 1) The GFRP is a high-strength and flexible material available for structural components;
Hysteretic behaviour 2) Its use as an outer constraint material is also a solution for poor corrosion resistance of the outer steel tube; In
Constraint ratio
this study, 11 BRB specimens with concrete infilled GFRP tubes and 3 BRB specimens with concrete infilled steel
Global buckling
tubes were designed to investigate the effects of the types of GFRP and constraint ratios on the hysteretic
behaviour of the GFRP tube BRBs. The performance of the GFRP tube BRBs was also compared to the steel tube
BRBs composed of three different lengths of steel tubes with the same wall thickness. All the GFRP tube BRB
specimens had the same rectangular steel inner core and included two types of GFRP tubes with three different
lengths and thicknesses. The medium- and long-length filaments winding GFRP tube BRB specimens buckled at
the last stage of the test, while global buckling developed the cracks in the middle of the GFRP tube. All other
BRB specimens didn’t buckle and underwent the complete loading process without degradation in stiffness and
strength. The finite element models of BRBs were built using ABAQUS, considering the constitutive models of the
GFRP, steel and concrete subjected to cyclic loading. The finite element model of the GFRP tube BRBs could
simulate the performance of the BRBs well, and the results of analysis were calibrated with experimental results.
All the BRB specimens exhibited good hysteretic behaviour, sufficient load-bearing capacity, large ductility and
energy dissipation capacity. The GFRP tube BRBs may share the same design criteria as the traditional steel tube
BRB by limiting their constraint ratios, and the GFRP tube may be used as an alternative to the traditional outer
restraining tube especially for those BRBs with strict durability requirement.

1. Introduction
As structural members resisting lateral forces, buckling-restrained
braces (BRBs) can achieve nearly the same strength and stiffness in both
tension and compression without buckling when subjected to large
compressive forces. Compared to the other lateral resisting system, such
as steel plate shear wall [1] and double-skin composite walls [2], the
structural system with BRBs is a high efficient, economical lateral re-
sisting and energy dissipation system. The BRBs have excellent energy
absorption capacity compared to the normal steel braces and therefore
have been widely used in seismic engineering and structure restoration.
Numerous experimental and numerical analyses have been conducted
to research the mechanical properties, stability and hysteretic beha-
viour of different types of BRBs.
Concrete-filled steel components are usually used as columns sub-
jected to compression, different component cross section forms and
load cases are considered in many research works [3–5]. The integral
BRBs, which are made by encasing a cross-shape steel inner core or flat
bar into a steel tube and by confining with infill concrete, have been
extensively studied. Black et al. [6] carried out stability analysis re-
garding flexural and torsional buckling of BRBs and presented test re-
sults of five BRBs with various configurations. Their study concluded
that the BRB is a reliable and practical alternative to conventional
lateral load resisting systems. Jia et al. [7] tested the cyclic behaviour of
the BRBs with H-cross section unrestrained segments of steel inner core
and concrete-filled steel tubes, which was compared to the BRBs with
cruciform cross-section unrestrained segments of steel inner core. Chou
and Chen [8] presented the experimental and numerical results on the
performance of the BRBs composed of a steel inner core and two
identical concrete filled channel steel restraining components, and
inner core was sandwiched with fully tensioned high-strength bolts to
prevent core buckling. The stability and hysteretic behaviour of the
proposed assembled BRBs are very good.
The concrete-filled steel restraining component BRB is a traditional

⁎
Correspondence to: Harbin Institute of Technology, 73 Huanghe Road, P.O. Box 2546, Nangang District, Harbin 150090, China.
E-mail addresses: 50391518@qq.com (H. Sun), jiamingming@hit.edu.cn (M. Jia), smzhang@hit.edu.cn (S. Zhang), wangyuyin@hit.edu.cn (Y. Wang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tws.2018.10.040
Received 12 December 2017; Received in revised form 25 September 2018; Accepted 30 October 2018
0263-8231/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
H. Sun et al.
type of BRB, which is easy to manufacture, economical and perfor-
mance-stable. However, the outer steel tube is susceptible to corrosion,
especially during application in factories and offshore engineering
buildings in a corrosive environment. Hence, new fibre-reinforced
polymer (FRP) materials have been introduced to the BRBs for corro-
sion resistance. Jia et al. [9] proposed a new assembled buckling-re-
strained brace (ABRB) wrapped with carbon or basalt fibre cloth. The
experiment and numerical simulation also showed that the proposed
ABRBs could satisfy the performance requirements of the BRB compo-
nents. Dusicka and Tinker [10] designed an ultra-lightweight BRB with
an aluminium core and bundled glass-fibre reinforced polymer (GFRP)
tubes for the buckling-restraint, which satisfied the global buckling
restraint and weighed 27% and 41% lighter than the traditional all-steel
and concrete-filled restraining component of the BRB configurations,
respectively. Deng and Pan [11] proposed a novel GFRP steel BRB. Four
GFRP tubes were tied together by wrapping the GFRP cloth and were
used to restrict the core steel plate buckling instead of the conventional
steel tube and infilled concrete or mortar. This GFRP steel BRB is ex-
tremely lightweight. The main failure modes of the GFRP steel BRBs
were local buckling at the end of the core steel plate and GFRP tube,
which developed along the edge of the tube, and the eventual rupture of
the outside GFRP wrapping layer.
This study proposed a new concrete-filled GFRP tube BRB that is a
practical alternative to the conventional member for BRB fabrication
and application. The fabrication method of the concrete-filled GFRP
tube BRB is the same as the conventional integral concrete-filled steel
tube BRB. The GFRP tube provides a solution for corrosion of the steel
restraining component. The self-weight of a BRB member can be re-
duced 5–10% when the steel tube is replaced with GFRP tube. Eleven
BRB specimens with concrete infilled GFRP tubes and three BRB spe-
cimens with concrete infilled steel tubes were tested, which were cali-
brated with finite element analysis. Based on the test and analysis re-
sults, an investigation was carried out on the effects of the constraint
ratio (CR) of BRBs, restraining component size, specimen length, the
thickness and the type of the external GFRP tubes on the hysteretic
behaviour and member performance. The failure modes, ductility and
energy dissipation capacity of the BRB specimens were studied. The
design criterion for the GFRP tube BRBs were provided according to the
limit value of CR based on the test and finite element analysis results.
2. Experiments using the GFRP tube BRBs
2.1. Test Specimens
In this study, 11 GFRP tube BRB specimens and 3 steel tube BRB
specimens were designed. The GFRP tube BRB consists of an inner steel
core encased in a GFRP tube filled with concrete (Fig. 1). The inner steel
core carries the axial load while the outer GFRP tube, instead of the
steel tube, provides the lateral support via the concrete to the core and
prevents global and local buckling.
Two types of GFRP tubes are used as the outer tubes of BRBs. One is
the filament winding (FW) GFRP tube with a winding angle of 56°,
which implies that it has high strength in the longitudinal direction but
is weak in the hoop direction. Three nominal thicknesses of these FW
GFRP tubes were employed: 6 mm, 8 mm and 9 mm. The other type is
the FRP pipe, which is manufactured by a special winding-pultrusion
(WP) combined process, and the WP GFRP tube is multiple layered with
fibres in both longitudinal and hoop directions. Only the 8-mm-thick
WP GFRP tube was used in the BRBs. The thickness of the steel tubes is
selected to be 3 mm, so that the section stiffness of the concrete infilled
GFRP tubes and concrete infilled steel tubes are similar. The diameter of
the cross sections of all outer tubes is 200 mm.
The lengths of the inner cores of the BRB specimens are 1560 mm,
2820 mm and 3520 mm and the external tubes have three lengths of
1200 mm, 2100 mm and 2900 mm. All the parameters are designed to
obtain different moments of inertia of the restraining components and
17
Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33
Fig. 1. Composition of the BRB specimens.
different CRs of the BRBs, and their effects on the BRB cyclic behaviour
are investigated. For all BRB specimens, the constraint ratio CR can be
calculated with Eq. (1) [12].
Pe π 2αEc Ic + ∑ π 2Ki Ei Ii ⎞
CR = = ⎛⎜ ⎟ Ay f y
Py ⎝ (μt Lt )2 ⎠ (1)
where Py and Pe denote the axial yield force of the inner core and the
Euler buckling load of the BRB based on the member length, respec-
tively; EcIc and EiIi are the bending stiffness of the inner core and con-
straint components, respectively. μtLt is the effective lengths of BRB
specimen, α is the ratio of post-yield stiffness to the elastic stiffness for
the inner core, Ki is the stiffness reduction coefficient of the constraint
components, whose values vary upon different constraint components,
and Ay and fy are the area and yield strength of the inner core, re-
spectively.
The load-carrying element of the BRB used in this experiment was
divided into a central yielding part and two end-strengthened non-
yielding parts. As shown in Fig. 1, rectangular steel sections with a
constant cross-sectional area were used as the yielding segments of the
inner cores, while the cross-section of the non-yielding segments is H-
shaped. With a smaller cross-sectional area, the centre part would yield
first and dissipate energy via its plastic deformation. The end portions
were enlarged and stiffened with the stiffeners for extra flexural rigidity
and buckling strength.
Fig. 1 and Table 1 show the details of the dimensions of the BRB
specimens. In Fig. 1 and Table 1, Lt is the total length of the BRB spe-
cimens; Lry is the length of the restrained yielding segment; Lny is the
length of the non-yielding segment with values of 660 mm, 1120 mm
and 1020 mm for short-, medium- and long-length specimens respec-
tively; Lrn is the length of the restrained non-yielding segment, which is
150 mm for the short-length specimens and 200 mm for the medium-
and long-length specimens; Lun is the length of the unrestrained non-
yielding segment of inner core, which is 180 mm for the short-length
specimens and 360 mm for the medium- and long-length specimens; w
and t are the width and thickness of the rectangular cross section of the
inner core plate, respectively; R is the radius of the outer tube; d is the
thickness of the outer tube; and Ls is the length of the outer tube. The
ratio of the ultimate strength to the yielding strength of the steel inner
core is larger than 1.5 and the width-to-thickness ratio of the rectan-
gular cross section of the inner core plate is 6.
2.2. Material properties
The 25-mm-thick steel inner-core plates were fabricated from the
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

Table 1
Details of the BRB specimens.
Order Types Specimens R (mm) d (mm) w (mm) t (mm) Lt (mm) Lry (mm) CR Failure modes

1 FW GFRP tube BRBs BRB-S-FW-9-1 98.6 8.91 149.6 24.8 1560 900 2.67 No buckling
2 BRB-S-FW-9-2 100.5 8.82 148.9 24.6 1560 900 2.67 No buckling
3 BRB-S-FW-9-3 99.3 8.65 147.6 24.3 1560 900 2.67 No buckling
4 BRB-S-FW-6-1 100.8 5.93 149.1 24.5 1560 900 2.54 No buckling
5 BRB-S-FW-6-2 100.9 5.73 146.8 24.8 1560 900 2.54 No buckling
6 BRB-S-FW-6-3 98.9 5.80 148.5 24.9 1560 900 2.54 No buckling
7 BRB-M-FW-8 99.8 7.92 149.0 24.6 2820 1700 0.80 Buckling
8 BRB-L-FW-8 99.5 7.86 148.8 24.8 3520 2500 0.52 Buckling
9 WP GFRP tube BRBs BRB-S-WP-8-1 100.3 7.90 147.9 24.7 1560 900 5.66 No buckling
10 BRB-S-WP-8-2 98.5 7.91 149.3 24.6 1560 900 5.66 No buckling
11 BRB-M-WP-8 97.3 7.89 148.7 24.8 2820 1700 1.73 No buckling
12 Steel tube BRBs BRB-S-G-3 100.5 2.86 147.8 24.9 1560 900 15.89 No buckling
13 BRB-M-G-3 99.8 2.91 149.2 24.8 2820 1700 4.86 No buckling
14 BRB-L-G-3 99.6 2.89 148.3 24.6 3520 2500 3.12 No buckling

For BRB specimen labels, S refers to the short one, M refers to the medium one, L refers to the long one; FW and WP refer to the outer tube of the BRB specimens with
filament winding or winding-pultrusion GFRP, respectively; G refers to the outer steel tube BRB specimens; 3, 6, 8 and 9 refer to the outer tube thickness of 3 mm,
6 mm, 8 mm and 9 mm; the last number of the BRB specimen label is the serial number of the same specimens.

Chinese Q235B steel, so that the BRB inner cores could yield at an early
stage and consume more seismic energy. The material properties were
obtained from the tensile coupon tests of the steel inner-core plates. The
yield strength and the ultimate strength of the steel inner core plates are
273 N/mm2 and 433 N/mm2, respectively; thus, the ultimate tensile
strength is 1.58 times the yield strength. The elastic modulus of the
steel inner core plates is 2.05 × 105 N/mm2. The nominal yield load Py
and the ultimate load (Pu =Ay fu) of the load-carrying element of the
BRB specimens are 1023.8 kN and 1623.8 kN, respectively.
The space in the tubes is limited; hence, fine aggregate concrete was
used for all BRB specimens to facilitate concrete casting. The concrete
had low water cement ratio and shrinkage, and thus the inner steel core
could be restricted closely and the integrity of the BRBs would be in-
creased. The concrete strength and the elastic modulus of concrete are
29.4 N/mm2 and 2.9 × 104 N/mm2, respectively. Besides, the crushing
strain and the strain corresponding to the peak stress of the concrete are
3.787 × 10−3, 1.633 × 10−3, respectively, and the crushing strain is
corresponding to about 50% peak stress. The tension strength and strain
of concrete are 2.9 N/mm2 and 1.1 × 10−4.
One of the purposes of this paper is to enhance the knowledge of the
effects of the fibre orientation of the GFRP tubes on the hysteretic
performance of the BRBs. Both the properties in the longitudinal and
hoop direction of the GFRP tubes are vital for the local and global
stability of the BRBs, as longitudinal stiffness prevent the BRBs from
buckling under compression, while enough hoop strength is necessary
to confine the concrete and to restrict the local buckling of the inner
cores. Three types of material tests were conducted to determine the
hoop tensile, longitudinal tensile and compressive mechanical proper-
ties of the GFRP tubes.
The longitudinal compressive strength and the elastic modulus of
the GFRP tubes were obtained according to the Chinese code [13].
Three GFRP ring specimens of 60 mm heights were cut from each type
of the GFRP tube to determine the longitudinal stiffness of the tubes.
The specimens were tested under a 2500-kN MTS machine under a
controlled loading rate of 0.06 mm/min. A ball hinge on the top guar-
anteed that the specimens were evenly compressed during the tests
(Fig. 2(a)). On each specimen, three strain gauges were evenly spaced
along the hoop. The FW GFRP rings failed under compression when the
matrix was damaged because of the shear force, while the WP GFRP
rings failed by delamination. The stress-strain relationship of GFRP is
linear as shown in Fig. 2(b, c).
The hoop tensile strength of the GFRP tubes was obtained from the
split disk tests following the ASTM D2290-12 [14]. Three hoop GFRP
rings of 24 mm height were cut from the two types of GFRP tubes. The
self-made test equipment consisted two same parts, one of which
included the two disassembled L steel plates. The GFRP ring was
sandwiched by the two L steel plates in the top and bottom, while two
steel bars passed through the GFRP ring and the two L plates, ensuring
that the GFRP ring was fixed closely to the test equipment. There were
two areas with reduced cross section in the GFRP hoop. The GFRP ring
stress was calculated by dividing the total tensile force by two times the
area of the reduced section, while the strain was calculated as the
average value of the GFRP hoop strain measured from the strain gauges
(Fig. 3(a)). The differences in performance among the FW GFRP rings of
different thicknesses were small enough to be ignored; hence, the ma-
terial properties of 6 mm FW GFRP tubes hoop were used to represent
the tensile strength of the FW GFRP tubes. Thus, for the material
properties of the WP GFRP tubes, the tensile hoop strength 503 MPa
and elastic modulus 50.0 GPa could be used (Fig. 3(b)). The test results
of the three FW GFRP tubes showed a similar hoop strength of 421 MPa
and an elastic modulus of 31.4 GPa (Fig. 3(c)).
The longitudinal tensile properties were obtained from the tensile
standard coupon tests following the Chinese code [15]. Typical speci-
mens were cut from the tubes in the longitudinal direction. Both ends
were smeared with a thermosetting resin, making it easy to fix the
specimens on the tensile testing machine. This method could be viewed
as an estimation of the real longitudinal tensile properties of the GFRP
material. The specimens failed when the matrix and the fibres de-
bonded. The resulting tensile strength and modulus were slightly higher
than the compressive test results because of the different failure modes.
The mechanical properties of the GFRP tubes based on the three series
of material tests are given in Table 2.
As shown in Table 2, a main characteristic of GFRP is orthotropic,
i.e., strong in the hoop direction and weak in the longitudinal direction,
which differs from that of steel. Specifically, GFRP has higher strength
and lower elastic modulus than the ordinary steel along hoop direction,
while the properties of GFRP along longitudinal direction depend on
wrapping technology and other factors. Generally, both strength and
elastic modulus in the longitudinal direction are lower than those in the
hoop direction.
2.3. Manufacture of the test specimens
To minimise the deformation and the initial stress from thermal
processing, the load-carrying element of the BRB was fabricated by cold
work except for the welding. The initial deformations of the inner cores
had been measured before the specimens were tested, which were less
than Lt/1000. The two end portions of the inner cores were strength-
ened by welding four steel plates on the original steel plate to form the
H-cross section, as shown in Fig. 4(a). Foam blocks were placed under

18
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

Ball hinge

Strain gauges

Lower plate

a) GFRP tubes under longitudinal compression test

320 100
N N

80
240

Stress(MPa)
Stress(MPa)

N N
60
160
40
80 WP specimen1 FW specimen1
WP specimen2 20
FW specimen2
WP specimen3
FW specimen3
0 0
0.000 0.002 0.004 0.006 0.008 0.010 0.012 0.000 0.002 0.004 0.006 0.008 0.010
Strain Strain
b) Relationship of longitudinal compression stress and strain c) Relationship of longitudinal compression stress and strain
of 8mm WP GFRP tubes of 6mm FW GFRP tubes
Fig. 2. Compression test for determining GFRP longitudinal properties.

600
N

500
Stress(MPa)

Strain gauges 400

N
GFRP hoop 300

L steel 200
Reduced section WP specimen1
100 WP specimen2
WP specimen3
0
0.000 0.002 0.004 0.006 0.008 0.010 0.012
Strain
a) Hoop tensile test of GFRP tubes b) Tensile stress strain relationship
of 8mm WP GFRP tubes hoop

500
N

400
Stress(MPa)

300
N

200

FW specimen1
100
FW specimen2
FW specimen3
0
0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020
Strain
c) Tensile stress strain relationship of 6mm FW GFRP tubes hoop
Fig. 3. Split test of GFRP rings.

19
H. Sun et al.
Table 2
Mechanical Properties of the GFRP tubes.
Hoop Longitudinal
Tensile strength Tensile elastic modulus Tensile strength
(N/mm2) (N/mm2) (N/mm2)
FW GFRP tubes 421 3.14 × 104 92
WP GFRP tubes 503 5 × 104 284
the transition section and their contraction deformation was used to
absorb the axial deformation of the inner cores, so the contact of the
inner core and concrete was avoided. Three layers of PVC plastic film
were used as unbounded materials to wrap the inner cores after at-
tachment of the strain gages, as shown in Fig. 4(a). After this, the seal
plate with the H-hole and the inner core element were connected by
spot welding (the welding would be cut after depositing concrete); then
the outer tube was put on the seal plate and the position of the outer
tube was fixed precisely, as shown in Fig. 4(b). Plastic film was inserted
into the gaps between the seal plate and the outer tube and the gaps
between the seal plate hole and the inner core were also filled. The
objective of filling the gaps was to avoid water outflow from the outer
tube. The BRB specimens before casting concrete are shown in Fig. 4(b).
The concrete was casted into the GFRP tube from the other side without
seal plate, with concrete vibration carried out throughout the pouring
procedure. As shown in Fig. 4(c), BRB specimens are formed after
concrete casting. Another seal plate was put on the other side of the
outer tube after concrete casting. One end of the inner core element was
welded onto the steel end plate before the assembly processing and the
other end of the inner core element was welded onto the steel end plate
after the completion of the fabrication process. The BRB specimen be-
fore the test is shown in Fig. 4(d).
2.4. Test setup and procedure
The experiment was conducted at the Harbin Institute of
Technology. Two loading systems with close level of loading precision
were used in the test for the BRB specimens with different lengths. The
degree of accuracy of two loading systems could reach 0.01 mm dis-
placement amplitude in each loading step. The displacement transdu-
cers used in the two test instruments were the same and had the degree
of accuracy of 0.005 mm. As shown in Fig. 5(a), the short-length BRB
specimens were fixed to the Mechanical Testing System (MTS) with a
capacity of 2500 kN in compression and 2000 kN in tension by the aid
(b) Inner core in the
(a) Inner core element
GFRP tubes
Fig. 4. Fabrication of the BRB specimens.
20
Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33
Tensile elastic modulus Compressive strength (N/ Compressive elastic modulus
(N/mm2) mm2) (N/mm2)
1.08 × 104 82 1.22 × 104
2.57 × 104 241 2.94 × 104
of connection seat. The medium- and long-length BRB specimens were
tested by a self-made reaction frame loading system with 5000-kN
compression and tension capacity, as shown in Fig. 5(b). The testing
systems could evenly distribute the axial load along the cross-section of
the inner cores of the BRB specimens. The applied axial loads were
measured by the self-equipped load cell of the MTS or by the force
sensors. The corresponding axial deformations of the specimens were
measured by two displacement transducers and the average of the two
displacement values was considered as the axial deformation of the
specimen.
The loading protocol is shown in Fig. 6. The standard loading pro-
tocol was determined by the incremental displacement amplitudes ac-
cording to the ‘Chinese technical specification for steel structure of tall
building [12]’, containing Lry/300, Lry/200, Lry/150 and Lry/100. The
preloading was carried out by loads at the elastic stage to check the
working of the devices. The loading in the elastic stage was controlled
by force and the loading rate was 2–3 kN/s. The specimens were
compressed and tensioned circularly three times for each displacement
amplitude progressively. Besides, the displacement amplitude of Lry/70
was added to assess the larger cumulative plastic deformation and en-
ergy dissipation and to check if the failure might happen during addi-
tional loading cycles. The displacement amplitudes were increased until
the maximum displacement of Dbm (Dbm is equal to Lry/70 regulated by
the loading protocol) was reached.
2.5. Test results
2.5.1. Experimental phenomena and mechanism
All short-length FW GFRP tube BRB specimens weren’t found to be
buckled (Fig. 7(a)). Furthermore, all the WP GFRP tube and steel tube
BRB specimens hadn’t buckled, either (Fig. 7(b), (c)). The steel tubes
and the GFRP tubes of the no buckling specimens had almost no de-
formation and damage. For all the specimens, the inner cores had no
cracks during all the loading cycles. After all the loading cycles, no
(c) BRB specimens after (d) BRB specimen
concrete casting before the test
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

MTS

Test seat BRB specimen

Displacement
Transducer

MTS

(a) MTS loading device

Top beam

Column 1 Column 2

BRB specimen

Displacement
Transducer

Bottom beam
Connection rod

Hydraulic jack
Force sensor
Frame seat
Nut

(b) Reaction frame loading device

Fig. 5. Test devices and measurement instruments.

The connection seat of BRB-S-FW-6-1 showed weld-breaking during

3 3 3 3 3
the 10th circles, which was one of the same three specimens of BRB-S-
1/70 FW-6. As shown in Fig. 8, the buckling occurred in the medium and
1/100 long FW GFRP tube BRB specimens, that is, the specimens BRB-M-FW-8
1/150
1/200 and BRB-L-FW-8. The FW GFRP tubes of two buckling specimens frac-
1/300
0 tured eventually in the middle because of the large flexural deforma-
-1/300 tion. The specimens BRB-M-FW-8 and BRB-L-FW-8 completed almost all
-1/200
-1/150 loading cycles and buckled in the later stages of loading.
-1/100 Global bucking occurred on the specimen BRB-M-FW-8 accom-
-1/70
panying the degradation of the strength during the second cycle of the
Lry/70 displacement amplitude, and the corresponding strain of the
Fig. 6. Graphical representation of the loading protocol. yielding segment of the inner core was about 14,000 με. The flexural
deformation was small prior to global buckling and increased slowly
when global buckling occurred. The flexural deformation of the spe-
obvious slippage of inner core was observed according to the relative
cimen at the middle was determined by the combination of the axial
displacement of unrestrained segments to restraining component. The
force of the inner core and the bending moment caused by the flexural
enlarged section of unyielding segment of inner core didn’t contact with
deformation (Fig. 8(a)). The oblique fibres and the interfacial colloidal
the confined concrete, otherwise it may finally lead the concrete to
material between circumferential fibres fractured at the middle of outer
directly participate in the longitudinal force.
FW-GFRP tube, consequently inducing the final fracture of the

21
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

(a) BRB-S-FW-9-1 (b) BRB-M-WP-8 (c) BRB-L-G-3

Fig. 7. Experimental phenomena of the BRB specimens.

(a) Overall bending of (b) GFRP tube cracking and (c) Overall bending of
BRB-M-FW-8 fibres fracturing BRB-L-FW-8
Fig. 8. Global bucking of the BRB specimens.

circumferential fibre, as shown in Fig. 8(b).
Global bucking also occurred in the specimen BRB-L-FW-8 during
the third loading cycle of Lry/100, which was about 10,000με of the
yielding segment of the inner core. This was followed by a sudden in-
crease in the flexural deformation. Compared to the specimen BRB-M-
FW-8, the longer specimen BRB-L-FW-8 buckled at the earlier stage and
the flexural deformation occurred in the middle of the specimen ac-
companying the degradation of the strength. However, the specimens
were restored when unloaded and had only little residual deformation,
and the fracture occurred in the middle of the GFRP tube because of the
large bending deformation, as shown in Fig. 8(c).
All the BRB specimens were disassembled after the experiments and
the outer steel tubes and the GFRP tubes were cut. It was then found
that the concrete had cracked in the middle of the buckled FW GFRP
tube BRB specimens as a result of large flexural deformation (Fig. 9(a)),
and the concrete of other specimens was nearly undamaged (Fig. 9(b)).
After the concrete was smashed, it was found that the inner cores had
no cracks and the supposed multi-wave buckling is negligible since it
cannot be observed by naked eyes, as shown in Fig. 9(c).
Based on the test phenomena, the mechanism of the BRBs in the
study can be divided into two categories. For most specimens, such as
the BRBs with WP-GFRP tubes or steel tubes, the bending resistances
are higher, and no global buckling and local buckling occurred during
the whole test procedure. These specimens behaved expected working
mechanism for BRBs: the outer restraining materials restrict the
bending deformation of the inner core under compression, therefore the
original compression-bending mechanism changes to the approximate
axial force mechanism. This mechanism has been confirmed by the
monitored hysteretic curves, shown in Section 2.5.2, in which only the
hysteretic behaviour of the inner steel core has been exhibited.
GFRP fracture and global bucking failure mainly occurred in the
slender FW GFPR–BRB specimens. The predominant fibre winding di-
rection in the FW GFRP tubes is circumferential, and only small amount
is oblique of 45°, resulting in lower longitudinal elastic modulus and
strength. Therefore, the bending deformation and stress at the middle of
the inner core are larger during the compression process. Once the
stress reaches to a certain extent, the oblique fibres and the interfacial
colloidal material will fracture at the outer FW-GFRP tube and the
stiffness of concrete infilled GFRP tube will decrease. Global instability
of the specimens then finally occurs. Owing to high hoop strength of the
GFPR tube, strong hoop constraint for the inner core can be achieved,
which effectively restricts the local buckling.
Compared with steel, the main characteristic of GFRP is the ortho-
tropy. Thus constraint effects of GFRP on the inner steel core are very

22
H. Sun et al.
Cracked concrrete
(a) Buckling specimeens
(c) Inner core oof the non-buck
Fig. 9. BRB specimens after being disassembled.
different in longitudinal and hoop directions. GFRP can effectively
prevent local buckling of inner core due to the high strength in hoop
direction, whereas it contributes less to global buckling because of low
strength and elastic modules. Therefore it can be concluded that ad-
vantages of GFRP tubes are preventing local buckling of the BRB rather
than global buckling. The higher degree of the orthotropy, the greater
difference exists in the contributions to the local buckling and global
buckling.
2.5.2. Hysteresis curves
The hysteretic behaviour of the BRB specimens was tested based on
the quasi-static test with cyclic loading. It could be observed that all the
BRB specimens showed superior performance in terms of displacement
and strength, exhibiting stable hysteretic responses up to a core de-
formation of 1/70 the length of the inner core during the standard
loading test, stable hysteretic behaviour and good energy dissipation
capacity.
All the short-length FW GFRP tube BRB specimens, except the
specimen BRB-S-FW-6–1 that did not complete all the loading circles
because of the broken connection seat weld, showed stable and full
hysteresis curves during the whole testing process. The hysteretic
curves of the three specimens of the same group of the BRB-S-FW-9 are
shown in Fig. 10(a)–(c), and the hysteretic curves of the three speci-
mens of the same group of the BRB-S-FW-6 are shown in Fig. 10(d)–(f).
The BRB-S-FW-9 and BRB-S-FW-6 specimens had the same inner cores
but different GFRP tube thickness values of 9 mm and 6 mm, respec-
tively. The hysteresis curves of BRB-S-FW-9 and BRB-S-FW-6 specimens
were nearly same; hence, the hysteretic behaviour was determined
using the properties of the inner core when the CR was large enough to
exclude the buckling.
For the medium-length FW BRB specimens, as shown in Fig. 10(g),
the loading-bearing capacity of the specimen BRB-M-FW-8 declines
rapidly because of the global buckling when the compressive force is
about 1100 kN, which is at the second cycle at a displacement ampli-
tude of Lry/70; then its loading-bearing capacity drops to about 630 kN
rapidly. For the long-length FW BRB specimens, shown in Fig. 10(h),
the loading-bearing capacity of the specimen BRB-L-FW-8 declines ra-
pidly to about 650 kN because of the global buckling when the com-
pressive force is about 1050 kN, which is at the third cycle of the dis-
placement amplitude of Lry/100.
The short-length WP GFRP tube BRB specimens BRB-S-WP-8
23
Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33
(b) Non-buckling specimens
kling specimenss
complete the whole loading process and exhibit good hysteresis re-
sponses up to the core deformation of Lry/70. As shown in Fig. 11(a)
and (b), the hysteresis curves of the two specimens of the same group of
the BRB-S-WP-8 specimens are full and stable. The short-length spe-
cimen of the WP GFRP tube BRBs and FW GFRP tube BRBs showed
similar performance. As shown in Fig. 11(c), the specimen BRB-M-WP-8
did not buckle during the whole loading process and completed more
hysteresis cycles than the medium-length specimen of FW GFRP tube
BRBs. For specimens BRB-M-FW-8 and BRB-M-WP-8, the only differ-
ence was the material of the outer tube. It was shown that as the
moulding method of the GFRP tube changed from filament winding to
winding-pultrusion, the bending rigidity of the outer tube was en-
hanced, and the strength and stiffness of the external tube were im-
proved. Hence, buckling could be effectively prevented and more stable
hysteretic behaviour could be achieved. For WP GFRP tube BRBs, it can
be expected that the material strength and thickness indicate sufficient
bending stiffness and strength of the external tube, which results in a
good axial-load resisting capacity of the core elements.
As Fig. 12 shows, the steel tube of the BRB specimens completed all
the loading cycles and displayed good hysteretic behaviour, showing
similar performance as the WP GFRP tube BRBs and FW GFRP tube
BRBs before buckling. Three repeated hysteretic loops of the steel tube
BRB specimens coincided very well in the same displacement amplitude
and the components did not show performance degeneration during the
loading cycles as in the case of GFRP-BRB specimens.
2.5.3. Backbone curves
The backbone curves of the BRB specimens, shown in Fig. 13, in-
dicate that the resilience force models comply with the bilinear model.
The response of the BRB member is very similar to the pure steel ma-
terial model behaviour at the tension side of the backbone curve, while
different behaviour is observed at the compression stage. The tensile
strength of a steel member is generally higher than the nominal yield
strength because of the strain hardening effect. The compressive ca-
pacity of the specimens is slightly higher than the tensile capacity, the
reasons being the presence of friction between the inner core and the
restraining mechanism, enlarged cross section of the inner core under
compression and confinement of the restraining mechanism to the inner
core. The strength and stiffness under compression are larger than those
under tension.
The maximum tension and compression loads during the loading
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

Fig. 10. Hysteresis curves of FW GFRP tube BRB specimens.

Fig. 11. Hysteresis curves of WP GFRP tube BRB specimens.

24
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

1800 1800 1800

1200 1200 1200

600 600 600

Force (kN)
Force (kN)

Force (kN)
0 0 0

-600 -600 -600

CR:4.86
-1200 CR:15.89 -1200 Length:2820mm
-1200 CR:3.12
Length:3520mm
Length:1560mm
Tube wall:3mm Tube wall:3mm
-1800
Tube wall:3mm -1800 -1800
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 -40 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 40
Displacement (mm) Displacement (mm) Displacement (mm)

(a) BRB-S-G-3 (b) BRB-M-G-3 (c) BRB-L-G-3

Fig. 12. Hysteresis curves of the steel tube BRB specimens.

2000 intensity and no obvious multi wave buckling existed in the inner core.
1500 BRB-S-G-3
BRB-M-G-3
1000 BRB-L-G-3 2.5.4. Ductility analysis
BRB-S-FW-9-1 A measure especially designed to describe the plastic demand on a
Force (kN)

500 BRB-S-FW-9-2
BRB-S-FW-9-3
BRB is the cumulative plastic ductility (CPD), which is a normalised
0 BRB-S-FW-6-1 BRB-S-FW-6-2 expression defined by
BRB-S-FW-6-3
-500 BRB-M-FW-8 + −
Δpi − Δpi
-1000 BRB-L-FW-8 CPD = ∑ Δy
BRB-S-WP-8-1 i (2)
-1500 BRB-S-WP-8-2
BRB-M-WP-8 In addition, the displacement ductility ratio is also introduced to
-2000
-40 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 40 assessment the deformation capacity of the BRB specimens, and the
Displacement (mm) ductility ratio is defined by

Fig. 13. Backbone curves of BRB specimens. Δm

procedure are Pt max andPc max , respectively. The tension strength ad-
P
justment factor ω = t Pmax and compression strength adjustment factor
y
P
β = Pc max are introduced to analyse the loading-bearing capacity of the
t max
BRB specimens, as shown in Table 3. The tension strength adjustment
factors are adopted to indicate the strain hardening degree, while the
compression strength adjustment factor is used to compute the un-
balanced force of compression and tension.
The tension strength adjustment factors are between 1.25 and 1.36,
which indicate large strain hardening and inelastic deformation of the
inner core steel. The compression strength adjustment factors are be-
tween 1.00 and 1.11, which are less than the most experimental results
[6,8], but satisfy the upper limit of 1.3 specified in the AISC/SEAOC
recommended provisions for buckling-restrained braces (2001). When
the BRBs are installed in the form of V or inverse V in the frame, large
difference in compression and tension strength of the BRBs will result in
vertical unbalanced force on the beam, so the compression strength
adjustment factors should be limited. The particular configuration is
needed for the BRB specimen design to reduce the imbalance of com-
pression and tension strength, so the appropriate compressive de-
formation of unbounded material is used for providing the deformation
space of inner core. The gaps between the inner cores and the restrained
concrete components are calculated according to the maximum de-
formation of the inner cores in the cross-sectional width and thickness
orientations, with the gaps in cross sectional width and thickness or-
ientations found to be 1 mm and 0.5 mm. So no sufficient compression
μD =
Δy (3)
where +
Δpiand −
are respectively the maximum positive and negative
Δpi
plastic displacements, during each visit i into the inelastic range, and
Δy , Δm are the yielding displacement and the maximum displacement
during every loading cycle of the BRB, respectively.
The BRB specimens were able to develop the strength of Q235B steel
and showed dramatic strain-hardening behaviour. As shown in
Fig. 14(a), the steel tube BRB specimens with different lengths ex-
hibited similar cumulative plastic ductility. For the external FW GFRP
tube BRBs, Fig. 14(b) showed that the short-length specimens showed
superior performance to the other specimens, while displaying stable
hysteretic curves until the ductility ratio reached 11. The maximum
loading displacement of BRB specimen is Lry/70 (Lry is the length of the
restrained yielding segment), and the ductility ratio 11 is the ratio of
the maximum loading displacement to the yield displacement of BRB
specimen during the loading process. The BRB-S-FW-9 specimens ac-
cumulated hysteretic energy and axial plastic deformation at each
loading cycle. The average cumulative plastic ductility (CPD) of the
specimens BRB-S-FW-9 was 297. The BRB-M-FW-8 specimen buckled at
the 1/70 displacement amplitude and reached the maximum ductility
of 11. The CPD of the BRB-M-FW-8 was 237, thereby already exceeding
the AISC requirement that the cumulative plastic ductility (CPD) should
be more than 200 (this is indicated as the dotted lines in the figures).
The BRB-L-FW-8 specimen buckled after two complete cycles of 1/100
displacement amplitude and had the CPD value of 160, a figure
somewhat lower than the AISC value. The external WP GFRP tube BRB
specimens exhibited good plastic deformation capacity (Fig. 14(c)),

Table 3
Tension strength adjustment factors and compression strength adjustment factors.
BRB-S-FW-9-2 BRB-S-FW-6-2 BRB-M-FW-8 BRB-L-FW-8 BRB-S-WP-8-1 BRB-M-WP-8 BRB-G-S-3 BRB-G-M-3 BRB-G-L-3

ω 1.30 1.31 1.25 1.28 1.30 1.30 1.39 1.36 1.27

β 1.08 1.07 1.11 1.00 1.09 1.09 1.12 1.12 1.06

25
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

Fig. 14. CPD of three different outer tube BRB specimens.

350 350 350

BRB-S-G-3 300 BRB-M-G-3
300 300
BRB-S-FW-9 BRB-M-FW-8
250 BRB-S-WP-8 250 BRB-M-WP-8 250
200 200 200
CPD

CPD
CPD

150 150 150

100 100 100
50 50 50
0 BRB-L-G-3
0 0 BRB-L-FW-8
-50 -50
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70
Strain Strain Strain

(a) short length BRB specimens (b) medium length BRB specimens (c) long length BRB specimens
(Length=1560mm) (Length=2820mm) (Length=3520mm)
Fig. 15. Comparison of CPD of different outer tube BRB specimens.

reaching the maximum ductility ratio of 11 and the CPD of about 300, a
value considerably higher than the AISC value.
As shown in Fig. 15, the developments of the CPD of the external
WP GFRP tube BRB, the FW GFRP tube BRB and the steel tube BRB
specimens progress through a similar process and the CPD of the steel
tube BRB specimens is about 300, which is significantly larger than the
AISC value of 200. The CPDs of the medium- and long-length FW GFRP
tube BRBs are less than that of the steel tube BRBs because of the
buckling of specimens, but the CPDs of the FW GFRP tube BRBs are
larger than or close to 200.
The relationship between the cumulative plastic ductility (CPD) and
the constrain ratio (CR) was plotted in Fig. 16. The maximum CPD of
the BRB shows a continuous increase trend as the CR increases to 2, and
then the maximum CPD keeps approximately unchanged with the CR
320
280
maximum CPD
increasing. While the CR is smaller, the failure of the BRB is caused by
the global buckling. As the CR increased, the global buckling of BRB can
be excluded due to the larger stiffness of BRB, and the larger CPD would
develop. So the maximum CPDs of the BRBs have positive relationship
with the CR. However, while the CR is large enough to prevent the
global buckling, the plastic deformation and energy dissipation devel-
oped in the inner core. The BRB specimens with the larger CRs could
complete the whole loading process, and the CPD of them are ap-
proximately same.
2.5.5. Energy dissipation capacity
The secant stiffness Ki, cumulative energy Eh, energy dissipation
ratio ψ and equivalent viscous damping coefficient he are used here to
measure the energy dissipation capacity of the test specimens.
According to the definition in Fig. 17, the values of Ki, Eh, ψ and he can
be calculated by Eq. (4), Eq. (5), Eq. (6) and Eq. (7), respectively.
The measured stiffness values are extracted from the recorded loops
using the relation:
| + Fi | + | − Fi |

Ki =
| + Δi | + | − Δi | (4)
240
where Ki is the secant stiffness in the ith recorded loop. As shown in
200 Fig. 17(a), Fi and Δi are the maximum load and displacement in the ith
recorded hysteric loop, respectively.
The accumulative energy, Eh, is the sum of the area enclosed by
160
force F versus displacement Δ hysteretic loops, representing the hys-
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 teretic energy dissipated by the BRB. It can be stated as follows:
CR
Eh = ∑ ∫ FdΔ
Fig. 16. Relationship between the CPD and the CR. i (5)

26
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

(b) Definition of the energy (c) Definition of the equivalent

(a) Definition of the secant stiffness Ki
dissipation ratio ψ viscous damping coefficient he
Fig. 17. Definition of energy dissipation indexes and secant stiffness.

The energy dissipation ratio ψ is defined by dividing the dissipated 1 area(ABC + CDA)
he =
energy by the total work done by the forces: 2π area(OBE + ODF) (7)

S1
ψ=
S1 + S2
where S1 and S2 are the absorbed energy and the discharged energy,
respectively (see Fig. 17(b)); and S1+ S2 gives the total work done by
the horizontal force. It is clear that a large value of ψ implies sufficient
energy dissipation capacity of the BRB specimen.
Under cyclic loading conditions, the strength and stiffness of BRB
decrease, which is depicted by the equivalent viscous damping coeffi-
cient he. The value of he represents the ratio of the dissipated energy
(areas of ABC and CDA) to the absorbed energy (areas of OBE and ODF)
of equivalent elastic component that undergoes to the same displace-
ment (see Fig. 17(c)), yielding
As Figs. 18–20 show, the secant stiffness of the BRB specimens de-
(6) creases as the strain increases, which indicates sufficient plastic de-
velopment of the inner core. The energy dissipation area of the BRB
specimens increases with the loading process, and the energy dissipa-
tion ratios and the viscous damping coefficients of the BRB specimens
increase with strain development. The average values of the accumu-
lated energy dissipation area, maximum energy dissipation ratio and
viscous damping coefficient of the WP GFRP tube BRB specimens, FW
GFRP tube BRB specimens and steel tube BRB specimens are listed in
Table 4. The energy dissipation ratios of the BRB specimens are about
0.95 and the viscous damping coefficients of the GFRP tube BRB spe-
cimens are about 0.45, which are respectively close to the maximum
values of the energy dissipation ratio (value of 1) and the viscous
damping coefficient (value of 0.64). The external GFRP tube BRB

350 8.0x104
Energy dissipation area (kN·mm)

BRB-S-G-3
Secant stiffness (kN/mm)

300 BRB-S-G-3 BRB-S-FW-9-1

BRB-S-FW-9-1 BRB-S-WP-8-1
250 BRB-S-WP-8-1
6.0x104

200
4.0x104
150
100
2.0x104
50
0 0.0
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70
Strain Strain
(a) Strain-secant stiffness curve (b) Strain-cumulate energy dissipation area curve

1.2 0.6
Viscous damping coefficient
Energy dissipation ratio

1.0 0.5

0.8 0.4

0.6 0.3

0.4 0.2
BRB-S-G-3 BRB-S-G-3
0.2 BRB-S-FW-9-1 0.1 BRB-S-FW-9-1
BRB-S-WP-8-1 BRB-S-WP-8-1
0.0 0.0
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 -- 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 --
Strain Strain
(c) Strain-energy dissipation ratio curve (d) Strain-viscous damping coefficient curve
Fig. 18. Comparison of energy dissipation capacity of short length BRB specimens.

27
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

180 12

Dissipated energy (x104kN·mm)

Secant stiffness (kN/mm)
BRB-M-G-3 BRB-M-WP-8
160 BRB-M-FW-8 10 BRB-M-FW-8
BRB-M-WP-8 BRB-M-G-3
140
8
120
6
100
4
80
2
60
40 0
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 --
Strain Strain
(a) Strain-secant stiffness curve (b) Strain-cumulate energy dissipation area curve

1.1

Viscous damping coefficient

0.5
Energy dissipation ratio

1.0
0.4
0.9 0.3
0.8 0.2
BRB-M-G-3 BRB-M-G-3
B
0.7 0.1 B
BRB-M-FW-8
BRB-M-FW-8
BRB-M-WP-8 B
BRB-M-WP-8
0.6 0.0
1/30
00 1/200 1/150 0 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200
1 1/150 1/100 1/70
Strain Strain

(c) Strain--energy dissipaation ratio curvee (d) Strain-visccous damping co

oefficient curvee
Fig. 19. Comparison of energy dissipation capacity of medium length BRB specimens.

140
20
)
Secant stiffness (kN/mm)

104kN·mm

BRB-L-G-3 BRB-L--G-3
120 BRB-L--FW-8
BRB-L-FW-8 16
Dissipated energy (x10 kN

100
12
80

60 8

40 4

20 0
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1
1/200 1/150 1/10
00 1/70
Straiin Strain
(a) Sttrain-secant stiff
ffness curve (b) S
Strain-cumulatee energy dissipaation area curvee

1.1
Viscous damping coefficient

0.5
Energy dissipation ratio

1.0
0.4
0.9
0.3
0.8 0.2

0.7 BRB-L-G-3 0.1 BRB-L-G-3

BRB-L-FW-8 BRB-L-FW-8

0.6 0.0
1/300 1/200 1/150 1/100 1/70 1/300 1/200 1/150 1/10
00 1/70
Strain
n Strain
(c) Strain--energy dissipaation ratio curvee (d) Strain-visccous damping co
oefficient curvee
Fig. 20. Comparison of energy dissipation capacity of longest BRB specimens.

specimens exhibit good energy dissipation capacity, similar to the steel secant stiffness. Furthermore, the energy dissipation indexes such as
tube BRB specimens. Besides, the external WP GFRP tube BRB, FW energy dissipation area, energy dissipation ratio and viscous damping
GFRP tube BRB and steel tube BRB specimens with the same lengths coefficient indicate the GFRP tube BRB can achieve the same perfor-
exhibit similar behaviours, with similar changing processes of the mance as the steel tube BRB.

28
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

Table 4
Maximum values of the energy dissipation indexes of BRB specimens.
Maximum accumulated energy dissipation area (kN m) Maximum energy dissipation ratio Maximum viscous damping coefficient

FW GFRP tube BRB BRB-S-FW-9 63,577 0.917 0.406

BRB-M-FW-8 59,488 0.961 0.463
BRB-L-FW-8 99,158 0.986 0.483
Average value 74,074 0.955 0.451
WP GFRP tube BRB BRB-S-WP-8 63,133 0.913 0.402
BRB-M-WP-8 103,536 0.982 0.511
Average value 83,335 0.948 0.457
steel tube BRB BRB-S-G-3 63,283 0.913 0.399
BRB-M-G-3 107,049 0.988 0.499
BRB-L-G-3 159,431 0.99 0.489
Average value 109,921 0.964 0.462

3. Finite element analysis
3.1. Finite element models
Finite element analysis was conducted using the nonlinear finite
analysis software, ABAQUS. The previous study [16] indicated that the
mechanical behaviour of steel under cyclic loading is different from
that under monotonic loading. Therefore, the combined kinematic
hardening model provided by ABAQUS was adopted to simulate the
nonlinear behaviour for metal under cyclic loading; and Deng et al.
[17] demonstrated that this model is used effectively to characterize the
stress-strain relationship of steel. The parameters in the combined ki-
nematic hardening model of ABAQUS proposed by Shi et al. [16] and
Deng et al. [17] were combined with the monotonic coupon test data,
which are capable of characterizing the cyclic behaviour of the steel.
The back stress formula of the material model provided by ABAQUS is
n
Ck pl
α= ∑ γk
(1 − e−γk ε )
k=1
where α represents the back stress, which indicates the movement of
the yield surface, ε pl is the equivalent plastic strain, and Ck and γk
(k = 1,2) are parameters of the model. The initial yield stress and
Young's modulus were obtained from the coupon test. For the typical
Chinese Q235B steel, the Poisson’s ratio is 0.3. In addition, the Ck nd γk
could refer to the calibrated values from literature [18]. The material
parameters were given in the Table 5.
In addition, the stress-strain relationship obtained from the coupon
test, agreed well with that obtained from the numerical calculation,
which demonstrated the effectiveness of the material model and cor-
rectness of the parameters given in Table 5.
In order to capture the effects of concrete cracking, the concrete-
damaged plasticity (CDP) model in ABAQUS was used to simulate the
concrete. The CDP model enables defining the concrete compressive
behaviour, tension stiffening as well as the damage evolution in tension
and compression. The strength enhancement of concrete under tri-axial
compression can be simulated by the definition of the yielding surface.
In the modelling, parameter of dilation angle is 30°, the flow potential
eccentricity is 0.1, and the ratio of the second stress invariant on the
tensile meridian is 0.67. The ratio of initial equibiaxial compressive
yield stress to initial uniaxial compressive yield stress was adopted in
the simulation, which can be defined while a uniaxial stress-strain re-
lationship is defined. This simulation method has been used for CFST
columns by many researchers [19,20]. Those parameters were
Table 5
Material parameters of the Q235B steel used in ABAQUS model.
Yield stress Young’s Poisson’s ratio C1 γ1 C2
(MPa) modulus (GPa)
273 205 0.3 9 × 109 250 2 × 1010
extensively adopted in other researches [21,22], and were turned to be
valid for characterize the three-dimension stress states of the concrete
confined by tubes in BRB. So it is reasonable to consider the CDP model
is capable of capturing the cyclic response of the BRB with concrete
confined by external tubes.
Particularly, considering the different confinement capacity of the
steel tube and GFRP tube, the constitutive model of the steel tube
confined concrete recommended by Han et al. [23] was introduced, and
the constitutive model of GFRP confined concrete proposed by Jiang
and Teng [24] was also adopted in the research. Thus, the corre-
sponding stress-strain relationship curves of the ordinary concrete were
calibrated to represent the steel tube confined concrete and GFRP tube
confined concrete, and then input those relationship curves to the
ABAQUS. For brevity, the detail mathematical expressions were not
listed in this part. The ordinary concrete strength and elastic modulus,
the crushing strain, the strain corresponding to the peak stress of the
concrete, the tension strength and strain were obtained from material
characteristic test.
(8) From the material tests, it can be seen that the stress-strain curve of
the GFRP material is nearly linear, and the experiments were inter-
rupted while tensile rupture was observed in the outer tube, so an
elastic constitutive model can characterize the GFRP well before the
fibre failure. Once the stress of the GFRP tube exceeded the ultimate
strength of longitudinal or hoop orientation, it was considered that a
failure has occurred in the large stress region. Furthermore, as an or-
thotropic material, the elastic modulus and the ultimate strength of the
GFRP tubes were assigned in the longitudinal and hoop directions, re-
spectively. The corresponding parameters are listed in Table 2, and
which were adopted in the elastic constitutive model of GFRP materials
in ABAQUS.
The interaction between the steel inner core and the restraining
component was modelled with hard surface-to-surface contact beha-
viour, allowing separation of the interface in tension and no penetration
of that in compression. A frictional coefficient of 0.15 was used to si-
mulate the greasy plastic film interfaces between the steel inner core
and the concrete. A sine deformation mode of the inner core as the
initial imperfection deformation was adopted by scaling the first
buckling mode and a deformation of Lt/1000 was used in the middle of
the inner core. The GFRP and concrete were tied without considering
relative motion between the two. The solid element C3D8R was chosen
to simulate the inner core and concrete, and the shell element S4R was
chosen to simulate the GFRP tube, both of which being reduced in-
tegrated elements with good analytical convergence. Two reference
points were coupled with two ends of the inner core and another two
reference points were constrained to simulate the boundary conditions
of the inner core. As shown in Fig. 21, material properties were at-
tributed to the finite element model, which was meshed properly. The
γ2 same loading protocol of the experiment was applied to finite element
models.
150

29
H. Sun et al.
(a)) Inner core (b)) GFRP tube
Fig. 21. Finite element model of the GFRP tube BRB.
3.2. Analysis results and comparison with experiments
The FW GFRP has less fibre in the axial direction compared to the
hoop direction, which means the strength and elastic modulus in the
axial direction are smaller. There are nearly the same amounts of fibres
in the axial and the hoop directions of the WP GFRP tube. No global
buckling was found to occur on the short GFRP tube BRB specimens,
which indicated that the GFRP type had no obvious impact on the
hysteresis behaviour of the specimens with large CRs. The maximum
compression stress contours of the BRB-S-FW-9-2 are shown in
Fig. 22(a), (b), and the deformations DL at midpoint of three specimens
are also marked in the sub-figures. Yielding occurred along the full
length of the yielding segments of the inner cores, but a smaller stress
existed in concretes and GFRP tubes. The stress distribution was vali-
dated against the experimental results. Almost no damage occurred in
the concretes and GFRP tubes, which are almost in the elastic stage. The
multi-wave buckling deformation is very small in the inner core, and
(a) Inner core of BRB-S- (b) GFRP tubbe of BRB-S-
FW-9-2 (DL=Lt/800) FW-9-2 (DL=Lt/1000)
B-M-FW-8 (DL=Lt/300)
(e) Inner core of BRB
B-L-FW-8 (DL=Lt/200)
(g) Innner core of BRB
Fig. 22. Maximum compression stress (N/m ) contours BRB specimens.
30
Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33
(c) Concrete (d) GFRP tube BRB
can be ignored in the research. The plastic deformation developed
adequately during the cyclic loading process, which is coincident with
the experiments. For the same length of specimens, the strength and
stiffness of the WP GFRP tubes are larger than the FW GFRP tubes;
hence, the maximum compression stresses of the inner core and GFRP
tubes of the BRB-M-FW-8 and BRB-L-FW-8 specimens under ultimate
compression deformation are respectively larger than those of BRB-M-
WP-8, as shown in Fig. 22(c)–(h). The deformations DL at midpoint of
three specimens are also marked in these sub-figures. Global buckling
occurred in the specimens BRB-M-FW-8 and BRB-L-FW-8 and the global
buckling flexural deformation occurred around the centre of the BRB
specimens in the tests and simulations. Therefore, the GFRP tubes
cracked at the middle in the tests, which being the same position of the
maximum stress in the stress contours of the simulation. The stress
distributions of the inner cores and GFRP tubes also displayed the de-
formation and stress conditions as a result of global buckling of the BRB
specimens. The whole lengths of the inner cores underwent yielding
(c) Inner coore of BRB-M- (d) GFRP tube of BRB-M-
WP-8 (DL=Lt/800) WP-8 (DL=Lt/1000)
GFRP tube of BRB-M-FW-8
(f) G B (DL=Lt/400)
GFRP tube of BRB-L-FW-8
(h) G B (DL=Lt/250)
2
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

1800 1800
180
00
1200 1200 120
00
600 60
00

Force (kN)
600
Force (kN)

Force (kN)
0 0 0

-600 -600 -60

00

-1200 -120
00
-1200 Experiment Experiment
E Experime
ent
ABAQUS A
ABAQUS -180
00 ABAQUS S
-1800 -1800
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 -15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 -40 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 40
Displacement (m
mm) Displacement (mm) Displaacement (mm)

(aa) BRB-S-FW-9-2 (b) BR

RB-S-WP-8-1 (c) BRB- L-G-3
1800 1800 180
00

1200 1200 120

00

600

Force (kN)
600 60
00
Force (kN)

Force (kN)

0 0 0

-600 -600 -60

00

-1200
Experiment
-1200 Experiment
E
-120
00 Experimeent
ABAQUS S
ABAQUS A
ABAQUS
-1800 -1800 -180
00
-30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30
-40 -30
0 -20 -10 0 10
0 20 30 40 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30
Displacement (m
mm) Displacement (mm)
D Displaccement (mm)

((d) BRB-M-FW
W-8 (e) BRB-M-WP-8
B (f) BRB--L-FW-8
Fig. 23. Comparison of the experimental and numerical simulation hysteretic curves of BRB specimens.

and the maximum stress existed in the middle of the inner cores. There 3.3. Design recommendations of the GFRP tube BRBs
are also obvious stress concentrations in the middle of the GFRP tubes.
The comparison of the hysteresis curves from the experiment and Currently, a global stability criterion has been accepted for the BRBs
the simulation results of the BRB-S-FW-9 and BRB-S-WP-8 are shown in combined with inner core and confining component, shown as Eq. (9).
Fig. 23(a), (b). It is clear that the simulations show good agreement In this criterion, the yield moment MyB of the restraining component
with the experimental results, although the experimental curves pinch (which is the critical moment at which the flexural rigidity of the re-
slightly because of the bolt slippage of the connection seats. straining component is maintained) should larger than the maximum
The tension bearing capacity of the specimens in the ABAQUS bending moment McB developed at the centre of restraining component
analysis is lower than the experimental result especially at the small according to the axial compression force of BRB.
displacement. According to the fabricating method of the members of McB < MyB (9)
the BRB, there may be some friction and cohesive effect between the
inner core and the confining component, which could increase the load Thus the stiffening requirement when the steel inner core of BRB
bearing capacity in the early stage of the experimental loading when reaches its axial yield force without global buckling can be further
the load bearing capacity of BRB specimens is relatively small, as shown expressed as follows, [25,26].
in Fig. 23(a), (b). Besides, there are typical uncertainty of friction and Py a
cohesive phenomena in the experimental process, which is not perfectly McB = < MyB
1 − Py / Pe (10)
simulated by the finite element model. Thus, there are some deviations
between the test and the simulation. where a means the initial deflection at the mid-span of the core.
P
The comparison of the experiment and the simulation results of the In Inequation (10), Pe = nEB = CR is the non-dimensional stiffness
y
BRB-L-G-3 are shown in Fig. 23(c). All the research results indicate that parameter of the restraining component based on the axial yield force
GFRP tube can be used as a substitute for the outer restrained tube of Py, which is also equal to the constraint ratio (CR) of BRB. The MyB can
the BRB specimens. Furthermore, the performance of the GFRP tube also be transformed to the non-dimensional strength parameter m yB of
BRB specimens satisfying the constraint ratio limit is the same as the the restraining component:
steel tube BRB specimens and can meet the requirements of the BRB
components. The comparisons of the hysteresis curves of the experi- MyB
m yB =
ments and the simulation results of BRB-M-FW-8, BRB-M-WP-8 and Py Ls (11)
BRB-L-FW-8 are shown in Fig. 23(d), (e) and (f). The analytical results
Therefore, Inequation (10) can be changed to the following in-
show that FE models of the GFRP tube BRBs could be used to simulate
equality:
to the performance of the BRBs satisfactorily.
Complementary simulations were conducted in the same method. 1 a
⎛1 − ⎞ m yB >
The hysteretic curves of BRB-FW-1.3, BRB-WP-0.95 are shown in ⎝ CR ⎠ Ls (12)
Fig. 24, where it can be seen that the BRB-FW-1.3 completed the entire
The CR -m yB
curve can be obtained with Eq. (12), shown in Fig. 25
test loading protocol without buckling, while the global buckling oc- which is divided into two regions. The region above the curve is the safe
curred in the BRB-FW-0.95. region, and global buckling region locates below the curve.
From the experiment and the simulation results, the CR -m yB curve
can be used as a reasonable limit of BRB global stability. Any

31
H. Sun et al. Thin-Walled Structures 136 (2019) 16–33

1500
1500

1000 1000
500
500

Force(kN)
Force(kN)
0
0
-500

-1000 -500
-1500
ABAQUS
-1000
ABAQUS
-2000
-30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30
-1500
-30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30
Displacement(mm)
Displacement(mm)

(a) BRB-FW-1.3 (b) BRB-WP-0.95

Fig. 24. Numerical simulation hysteresis curves of the BRB specimens.

BRB-S-FW-9-1 4. Conclusions
16 BRB-S-FW-9-2
BRB-S-FW-9-3
14 BRB-S-FW-6-1 Buckling-restrained braces with concrete infilled GFRP tubes were
BRB-S-FW-6-2
proposed in this study, and two molded GFRP were used as the external
12 BRB-S-FW-6-3
Stiffness (CR)

10
8
6 BRB-S-G-3
4 BRB-L-G-3
Safe region
2 BRB-FW-0.95
0 Global buckling region
0.0 0.1
Strength (mBy)
Fig. 25. Stiffened required strength and stiffness parameters of BRB specimens
at Py.
combination of stiffness and strength of the BRB specimens within the
safe region leads to stable axial tension and compression hysteretic
deformations without global buckling in the compressive stage. In
Fig. 25, it is shown that only the specimens BRB-M-FW-8, BRB-L-FW-8
and BRB-FW-0.95 locate in the global buckling region, which coincides
with their global buckling failure occurred in the tests and analysis.
According to Fig. 25, it can be found that compared to m yB , CR is the
dominant factor of BRB global stability. That means, from Eq. (1), the
longitudinal stiffness of constraint material actually is fundamental for
the global buckling resistance, once the geometrical parameters of BRBs
are determined. Take Specimens BRB-M-FW-8 (CR = 0.8) and BRB-M-
WP-8 (CR = 1.73), for example, the latter specimen showed better
cumulative plastic ductility and hysteretic energy dissipation over the
former ones only because of stronger longitudinal material properties of
WP over than FW tubes.
The results of the test and numerical simulation indicate that the
stability of BRB specimens studied in this paper can be estimated based
on whether CR is greater than 1.0, and the BRB specimens may be
suggested to be designed with the CR limit value of 1.0. However, the
requirements of CR in current codes are normally larger than 1.0, E.g.
the Chinese technical specification for steel structure of tall buildings
[12] recommends that the CR should be larger than 1.95. From the
experimental results of this paper and other researches [25,26], the
requirements in the current codes provide a sufficient safety margin for
the BRB design. The limit value of CR should be determined according
to structural member reliability in the practical engineering.
BRB-M-FW-8 tube of BRBs. The performances of the proposed GFRP-BRBs were also
BRB-L-FW-8 compared with the conventional steel-BRBs. The findings of this study
BRB-S-WP-8-1
BRB-S-WP-8-2 are summarized as follows:
BRB-M-WP-8
BRB-M-G-3
(1) GFRP can effectively prevent local buckling of inner core due to the
high strength in hoop direction, whereas it contributes less to global
BRB-FW-1.3
buckling because of a low longitudinal stiffness (finally leading to a
low CR). In the studied GFRP confined specimens, global buckling
only occurred in the medium- and long-length FW GFRP tube BRBs
0.2 0.3
whose outer tubes having the lower stiffness/CR. The steel-BRB, WP
GFRP-BRB and short FW GFRP-BRB specimens had stable hysteretic
responses and developed maximum compressive loads about 1.4 Py.
Therefore, FW GFRP tube may be suggested for short BRBs, and the
WP GFRP tube with better longitudinal property may be extended
to longer BRBs.
(2) Most of the GFRP tube BRBs displayed ideal inelastic deformation
capacity until the ductility ratio reached 11, and the CPD values of
no buckling BRB specimens are between 297 and 310, which are
significantly larger than the value of 200 specified in the AISC
seismic provisions. The GFRP tube BRB specimens have the bilinear
resilience force models. The secant stiffness of BRB specimens de-
creases as the strain increased, and the energy dissipation area in-
creases with the strain development. All the energy dissipation ra-
tios reach over 0.9 and the viscous damping coefficients increase up
to about 0.4, which is due to the sufficient development of plasticity
in the inner core.
(3) The GFRP tube BRB may share the same design criterion as the
traditional steel tube BRB. When the constraint ratio is greater than
1.0, global buckling may be prevented. The GFRP tube may be an
alternative to the outer restraining tube for BRBs to gain better
corrosion resistance.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the support provided by the
Key Research Project of the Ministry of Science and Technology of
China (Grant ID: 2017YFC0703406)
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