Composite floor slabs

Abstract

The present article comments on Chapter 6 of the EC4 which deals with composite floor slabs made up of concrete and steel sheeting. This type of structural element is becoming increasingly more common in this country, partly as a result of its ease of execution and its versatility, and the possibility of obtaining spans of around five meters. It is therefore essential that we have some type of standard in this respect as Spain does not have one of its own. EC4 intends to be a summary of the more traditional codes, based on failure analysis, together with more modern tendencies which consider the operational analysis as being decisive and to consider concepts such as brittleness and ductility in this type of slab. This article examines the more important aspects of the EC4 with regard to the actions to be considered, stress analysis, the verifications to be carried out and prior performance tests, all of which are essential and prove the importance of experimental testing.