| Summary: | European standards pertaining to design rules and recommendations for steel structures have been under revision in recent years with aim to improve the ease of use, increase harmonisation, to cover aspects of assessment, re-use and retrofitting of existing structures. In this process, rules covering the use of steels with yield strength above 460 MPa and up to 700 MPa have been included in EN 1993-1-1. Steels above 700 MPa and up to 960 MPa will be included in the upcoming version of EN 1993-1-12. The use of such steels has increased steadily over the last few decades because they allow for more light-weighted solutions than conventional steels. However, the material reduction inherent to such solutions increases structural slenderness, which in turn has implications for the bearing capacity of compressed members. Flexural buckling is one of the challenges that must be addressed when designing steel elements subject to compression. In Europe, the design flexural buckling resistance of a steel member is calculated using an equivalent imperfection factor based on the section type, fabrication method, and steel grade. This study presents a test campaign at Luleå University of Technology where 11 welded H-sections were tested in centric compression of which four were manufactured with S355 and seven with S960. The specimens were chosen to fill a gap in the literature data due to a lack of reported experimental tests on high-strength steel welded H-sections with nominal yield strengths above 700 MPa.
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