Experimental Study of Stainless Steel Angle Sections 3D-Printed by Wire-Laser Additive Manufacturing (WLAM)
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Additive manufacturing, often known as 3D-printing, is being increasingly used in the construction industry. This paper presents an experimental study on the load-carrying capacities of stainless steel equal-leg angle section stub columns 3D-printed by means of the emerging wire-laser additive manufacturing (WLAM) technology. The testing programme included material coupon tests, measurements of geometric properties and 16 stub column tests. Following the testing programme, a design analysis was carried out based on the obtained test data, where the applicability of Eurocode 3 to WLAM stainless steel equal-leg angle sections was assessed. The assessment results generally reveal that Eurocode 3 offers conservative design resistances for WLAM stainless steel angle section stub columns under compression. The Continuous Strength Method, which accounts for the effect of material strain hardening in the cross-section resistance prediction, was also evaluated and found to offer improved overall design accuracy over Eurocode 3.