Las eat 470 Torsion 15.1 Introduct ‘The average designer probably docs not worry about torsion very much. He or she thinks almost exclusively of axial forces, shears, and bending moments, and yet most reinforced concrete structures are subject to some degree of torsion. Until recent years, the safety factors required by codes for the design of reinforced concrete members for shear, moment, and so forth were so large thatthe effects of torsion could be safely neglected in all but the most extreme cases, ‘Today, however, overall safety factors are less than they used to be and members are smaller, with the result that torsion is a more common problem, “Appreciable torsion does occur in many structures, such as in the main girders of bridges, Which are twisted by transverse beams or slabs. It occurs in buildings where the edge of a floor slab and its beams are supported by a spandrel beam running between the exterior columns. ‘This situation is illustrated in Figure 15.1, where the floor beams tend to twist the spandrel beam laterally. Earthquakes can cause dangerous torsional forces in all buildings. This is particularly true in asymmetrical structures, where the centers of mass and rigidity do not coincide. Other cases where torsion may be significant are in curved bridge girders, spiral stairways, and balcony girders, and whenever large loads are applied to any beam “off center.” An off-center case where torsional stress can be very large is illustrated in Figure 15.2. It should be realized that if the supporting member is able to rotate, the resulting torsional stresses will be fairly small If, however, the member is restrained, the torsional stresses can be quite lage. FIGURE 152 Torsion in spandsel beams52 Torsional Reinforcing 474 FIGURE 152 Off-center loads causing torsion in main beam. Should a plain concrete member be subjected to pure torsion, it wil eack and fail along 45° spiral lines because of the diagonal tension corresponding to the torsional stresses. For a very effective demonstration ofthis type of failure, you caa take a piece of chalk in your hands and twist it until it beeaks. Although the diagonal tension stresses produced by twisting are very similar to those caused by shear, they will occur on all faces of a member. As a result, they add to the stresses caused by shear on one side and subtract from them on the other! Recently, there have been more reports of structural failures attributed to torsion. AS a result, a rather large amount of research has been devoted to the subject, and thus there is 4 much-improved understanding of the behavior of structural members subjected to torsion, On the basis of this rather extensive experimental work, the ACI Code includes very specitic requitements forthe design of reinforced concrete members subjected to torsion orto torsion combined with shear and bending. It should be realized that maximum shears and torsional forces may occur in areas where bending moments are small, For such cases, the interaction of shear and torsion can be particularly important as it relates to design. 15.2 Torsional Reinforcing Reinforced concrete members subjected to large torsional forces may fail quite suddenly if they are not specially provided with torsional reinforcing. The addition of torsional reinforcing, does not change the magnitude of the torsion that will cause diagonal tension cracks, but it ddoes prevent the members from tearing apart, As a result, they will be able to resist substantial torsional moments without failure. Tests have shown that both longitudinal bars and closed stirrups (or spirals) are necessary to intercept the numerous diagonal tension cracks that occur fon all surfaces of members subject to appreciable torsional forces. “The normal .-shaped stirrups are not satisfactory. They must be closed either by welding their ends together to form a continuous loop, as illustrated in Figure 15.3(a), or by bending their ends around a longitudinal bar, as shown in part (b) of the same figure, If one-piece stirrups such as these are used, the entire beam cage may have to be prefabricated and placed as a unit (and that may not be feasible if the longitudinal bars have to be passed between column bars) or the longitudinal bars will have to be threaded one by one through the closed stirrups and perhaps the column bars. It is easy to see that some other arrangement is usually desirable.472 CHAPTER 18 Torsion é 8 5 ; FIGURE 153 Closed stirrups (these types frequently bs 1) impractical FIGURE 154 Overlaping U stimups used as torsion reinforcing but not desirable.