Fatigue behaviour of cold-formed rail profiles for racking structures: a numerical simulation perspective

•    Cold roll forming is a continuous process aiming for progressive bending of sheet metal using stations with rotating rolls without changing material thickness;
•    The racking systems installed in warehouses are almost exclusively made of thin-walled cold-formed sections;
•    Fatigue design rules for cold formed steel sections are missing on a European level - FASTCOLD project aims at developing these rules.

The study  aims to:

•    Evaluate the distribution and magnitude of residual stresses for two profiles (U-channel and Z-section) due to the roll forming process;
•    Apply mechanical cyclic loads in the simulation models (U-channel and Z-section). Study the influence of existing residual stresses (due to the roll forming process) combined with external cyclic loads on the fatigue resistance of the profiles.