Wind Girts in Ram Elements

Question

Can anyone help with how to properly model wind girts in ram elements? I have a metal building I am designing that consists of metal panel supported by purlins and girts. Specifically, I am running into the issue where the girts are "bracing" my perimeter columns for wind load and thereby sucking up wind loads (i.e. axial force in girt) that should be taken by column bending. I tried an axial release in the girts which triggered local instabilities and so am now out of ideas on resolving this.

Seth Guthrie · Answer

It should be a simple matter of modeling the girts where they are, possibly rotating them 90 degrees, hinging them at both ends (an axial release is not needed), loading them, and running the model. For design, pay close attention to the column unbraced length variables since the girts might brace the column for bending, but not axial bucking (it all depends on the placement and size), or axial bucking in one axis only.