Numerical study of LSF walls made of cold-formed steel hollow section studs in fire

Cold-formed steel square and rectangular hollow section (SHS/RHS) studs are often used to replace the conventional lipped channel in light gauge frame (LSF) wall systems meet required high load demand. To ensure adequate structural fire resistance of SHS/RHS stud walls, four full-scale tests were previously completed under standard conditions. However, expensive time-consuming, while complex performance cannot be adequately explained through test observations results alone. Hence, a numerical study was undertaken by developing simplified sheathed finite element (FE) models tested walls. This paper provides details developed LSF walls made at both ambient elevated temperatures comparison with experimental results. The validated highlight advantage using cavity insulated further understand factors that may affect such as grade depth. In addition model, advanced modelling techniques explore effects sheathing localised plasterboard fall-off on behaviour fire. Overall, this presents model can predict other similar configurations.