Experimental study on flexural capacity of steel plate-concrete composite slabs

Using steel plate to replace the traditional reinforcement, steel plate-concrete composite slabs are formed of steel plate skins connected to an infill of concrete plate with welded stud connectors. According to different arrangement of steel plate, the composite slabs can be divided into single side steel plate-concrete composite slabs (SSC) and double sides steel plate-concrete composite slabs (DSC). In this paper, test of four SSC and three DSC specimens with different steel plate thickness, degree of shear connection and arrangement of the constructional reinforcement were carried out to study the effect of variables considered on the bending performances and the failure mode of the composite slabs. The tests results indicate that specimens with full shear connection show good performance on flexure strength and ductility in the loading process like reinforced beams. For specimens with partial shear connection in tension steel plates, the fracture of shear studs in shear spans decrease the flexural capacity greatly; for specimens with partial shear connection in compression steel plates, the buckling of steel plates under compression would decrease both the strength and the ductility. Based on the test results, the formulas for calculating the flexural capacity of steel plate-concrete composite slabs were also proposed. The calculation values show a good agreement with the tests results.