By Mama, Benjamin Okwudili
A study of the effect of axial load and associated shear deformation on stresses in redundant frames with axially loaded members is performed in this work through the use of Timoshenko beam-column stiffness coefficients and classical displacement method. It is shown that combined effect of axial load and shear deformation diminishes the bearing capacity of the structures and consequently, very large bending moments of about 130% - 177% of their conventional magnitudes can be realised even when the applied axial loads are less than the critical load for the frame.