Experimental study on steel plate shear walls with novel plate-frame connection

The bolt connections between frame and infill steel plate in steel plate shear wall (SPSW) are relatively weak, and their deformation around the holes of steel plate or fishplate induced by tension field effect causes difficulties in replacing the damaged infill steel plates. This paper proposes a novel plate-frame connection for thin SPSWs. The proposed connection, consisting of a fishplate with large holes, steel angles with standard holes, and bolts, is able to achieve a multi-stage force transfer mechanism. Two failure criteria of the proposed connection were defined, followed with shear test of the novel connection. Three SPSW structure specimens with various thicknesses of steel plate and plate-frame connections were tested. Finite element models for SPSW structure with novel connections were developed and verified by the test results. The influence of thickness of infill steel plate on the seismic performance and connection slippage of SPSW structure was evaluated. The results show that the novel plate-frame connection is convenient to install in SPSW as the precision requirement of bolt holes in traditional connection is mitigated. The SPSW structure with the novel connection exhibits similar seismic performance as that in the traditional bolts-connected SPSW structure. With the plastic deformation of angle steel at the latter stage, the load bearing and energy dissipation capacities of SPSW structure are increased by 0.83% and 5.4% as compared with those of the SPSW with the traditional bolt connection, respectively. The multistage stress model and two-stage failure criterion can accurately predict the failure of the plate-frame connection.