Behaviour Of Lattice Towers With Angle Profiles

Four experimental large-scale tests on angle section lattice towers are presented that have been carried out in the frame of ANGELHY, an RFCS (Research Fund for Coal and Steel) research project. The towers were subjected to pushover loading, applied in orthogonal or diagonal direction at their top. Failure occurred due to buckling of the braces or the legs, depending on the lay-out. This paper presents first the experimental tests. Then, the experimental tests are recalculated through the currently available design model. It is shown that this design model correctly predicts the failure modes. However, it is also shown that the Eurocode 3 provisions are very conservative and need to be improved. Therefore, a second design model has been applied to recalculate the towers. This alternative design model is more refined concerning the modelling of the tower and concerning the resistance checks. The application of the alternative design model leads to more precise results compared to the laboratory tests and to an increase in the tower resistances that are approximatively 10-30% higher than those obtained by the current Eurocode 3 model.