TITLE NO.
65-71
Beam Shear Strength Prediction by
Analysis of Existing Data
ByTHEODOREC.ZSUTTY
An empirical method which combines the tech-
niques of dimensional analysis and statistical re-
gression analysis is applied to existing sources of
reinforced concrete beam shear test data. For
beams with a/d above 2.5, the method has pro-
duced failure stress prediction equations of the
form v = k(fc'pdfa) 113 for both cracking and sud-
den diagonal tension shear. These equations have
a low percentage of prediction error for a wide
range of beam properties and test sources. The
high, but variable, shear failure stress of short
beams with ajd < 2.5 has a lower bound given
by the slender beam prediction equations. Further,
short lateral stub beams, without top and bottom
load and support block pressures, appear to have
slender beam behavior.
Keywords: beams (structura I); cracking ( frac-
turing); diagonal tension; regression analysis; re-
inforced concrete; shear; shear strength; statistica I
analysis.
THE IMPORTANCE OF OBTAINING a practical
know ledge of the shear strength of reinforced
concrete beams without web reinforcement has
brought forth a large store of beam test data.
These data have been produced by several respon-
sible research sources and cover a wide range of
beam properties. However, thus far, no working
theory of behavior is available which would in-
tegrate these test results from the several sources
with an accurate prediction equation for shear
strength. A combination of dimensional analysis
and statistical regression analysis is used to: first,
provide an empirical basis for the separation of
test beam behavior into the arch action of short
beams, and the beam action of slender beams; and
second, provide accurate prediction equations for
the shear strength of slender beams along with a
lower bound strength prediction for short beams.
In the interim preceding the formulation of a
rational theory for shear strength, these empirical
prediction equations can serve in the study of the
following aspects of beam shear behavior:
1. The appropriate influence, or weighting of
beam properties, such as fc' and p, on the strength
of slender beams.
ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968
2. The relative magnitudes of cracking shear,
sudden diagonal tension shear, and ultimate shear
for slender beams.
3. The variability of the high strength of "arch
action" in short beam tests, and the effect of beam
support conditions on this strength.
DESCRIPTION OF TEST DATA
The sources of beam shear test data to be used
in the following analyses are those published in
the following references: Diaz de Cossio and
Siess; 1 Moody, Viest, Elstner and Hognestad; 2
Watstein and Mathey; 3 Morrow and Viest; 4
Clark;" Bresler and Scordelis; 6 Mathey and Wat-
stein;' Van den Berg; 8 Krefeld and Thurston; 9
and Kani. 10
These data are all from shear failure tests of
simply reinforced prismatic concrete beams, with-
out web reinforcement, under one or two con-
centrated loads, and the recorded values are:
Vcr shear in beam recorded when diagonal crack
was either first noted or was estimated to have
traversed the neutral axis, lb
VDT shear in beam at sudden or diagonal tension
failure
V, shear in beam at ultimate failure
fc' companion concrete cylinder strength corre-
sponding to the concrete in the test beam, psi
As reinforcing steel area, sq in.
b beam width, in.
d beam depth to centroid of reinforcing steel, in.
a shear span from beam reaction to the first con-
centrated load point, in.
PREDICTION CAPABILITIES OF THE PRESENT
BUILDING CODE FORMULA
The formula now being used in ACI 318-63 for
the prediction of shear cracking load:
v(',. = 1.9 + 2500 p v crd L. 3.5 (1)
bdyf,.' Myfc'
943

ACI member Theodore C. Zsutty is associate professor, De-
partment of Civil Engineering and Applied Mechanics, San Jose
State College, San Jose, Calif. His professional experience in-
cludes service as a civil engineering officer in the USAF, and
structural design work with the consulting firm of Porter,
Urquhart, McCreary, and O'Brien, San Francisco. Professor
Zsutty received his PhD from Stanford University in 1962, and
his current research activity involves the use of probability
theory and statistics in the formulation of structural resistance
prediction equations.
has rather serious imperfections as a predictor of
the true behavior of the available beam shear
test results. These tests results are plotted on Fig.
1, and it can be seen that there is poor correlation
of test values of the dependent variable:
Also, some low values of the cracking shear
strength of beams occur for low values of:
p Vcr d
M\}fc'
and these low strength values are not well pre-
dicted by Eq. (1).
It will be shown in the following sections that
these prediction imperfections of Eq. (1) are
caused by: first, the evaluation of the formula
constants of A = 1.9, and B = 2500, by an em-
pirical fit to data representing two separate types
of beam behavior, arch action and beam action;
and second, the theoretical principal stress formu-
lation (in Reference 11) of shear cracking be-
havior does not properly represent or weight the
beam properties, such as fc' and p, that govern
shear strength.

with the independent variable: DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS FORMULATION OF

A PROPOSED PREDICTION EQUATION
The technique of dimensional analysis (Refer-
ence 12) is used to obtain the basic format of the

7.50

5.00

Vcr ..
bd If{"" ..... ....
... .
.-:..::: ;::;: .. ... .
.
. .......
.. .
..-.~.. ...:.:=:.~ : ..
.. . .
2.50 ;: ..:~:....
.. Vcr = 1.9 +2500 pVcrd
bd~ M {t;:

.-------- -------. --------.

0.0 0.200 0.400 0.600

Fig. 1-Plot of ACI cracking shear formula for all afd ratios; for afd :::::,._ 2.0, M = Vcr(a- d); for afd L 2.0,
M = V01.d; (Data References 1-9)

944 ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968

cracking shear strength prediction equation.
Later, regression analysis will be used to evaluate
the empirical constants, that weight the beam
properties in this format, in order to best agree
with the test data.
Using the basic dimensions of: F = force, and
L = length, then the basic dimensions of the test
data are:
V cr F (analyses will also be made for V m
and V,.)
fc' F L-2
A. L2
b=d=a=L
Applying Buckingham's Pi Theorem:
N 6 quantities (Vcr, fc', A., b, d, a)
k 2 basic dimensions (F, L)
q N - k = 6 - 2 = 4 dimensionless ratios,
which may be of the following forms:
Letting f, = k, fr'bl represent the concrete
strength in shear, with units of psi (F L- 2 )
Q1 Vcr Q A.
= bd f, ; 2 =p=
d
Qa=-
a
The ratio Q4 is neglected because of its nearly
constant value in the data, and also because of the
assumption that the b/d ratio has little influence
on the shear strength of beams within the prac-
tical range of normal proportions.
The resulting dimensionless ratio equation is:
b~f, = k 0 (p) b2 (dfa)b
or, using f.v = k, (fc') b1, the format of the shear
stress prediction equation becomes:
where constants k, b 11 b 2 , and b 3 are found by the
multiple regression analysis (see Reference 13)
of the data in the logarithmic form:
In [~d"] =Ink+ b 1ln (f/) + b2ln (p) + baln (d/a)
REGRESSION ANALYSES
Preliminary regression analysis of data leading to
the separation of beam action and arch action
In the first regression analysis of all data in the
linear form of Eq. (3) no effort was made to
segregate data according to the ajd ratio, and as a
result, the coefficient of variation of error V., or
average percent error, of the prediction Eq. (2)
was excessive (15 percent). Efforts were made
ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968
to segregate data according to small steel ratios,
low concrete strength, and bond areas. However,
these efforts did not essentially decrease v., and
it was decided to heed the experience of previous
investigators concerning the effect of the afd
ratio. Specifically, Leonhardtl 4 and KanP 5 show
curves of ultimate shear behavior for their par-
ticular test series that indicate extra strength in
beams with afd less than about 2.5. Using the
basic working concept that the observed shear
strength of top-loaded beams is governed by two
separate phenomena, roughly characterized as:
1. Beam action, meaning combined bending and
shear stress, for ajd > 2.5.
2. Arch action, meaning some type of compres-
sion stress or direct load transfer to supports, for
afd < 2.5,
and with the available procedure for the regres-
sion analysis of the data, it was possible to pro-
vide an empirical verification of the ajd = 2.5
separation value for all of the data sources. Three
separate analyses were made for all test beams
with ajd values above trial values of 2.0, 2.5, 3.0,
respectively. The analysis for ajd > 2.0 had a co-
bd
efficient of variation of error, v. of 15 percent,
and did not reflect an improvement over the first
analysis of beams with all afd ratios. The analysis
for ajd > 2.5 yielded a substantial reduction of
V. to an acceptable value of 10 percent, and about
the same value of V. was obtained for the a/d >
3.0 analysis. Thus, the value of aj d = 2.5 was
established, using small v. as the criterion, as the
means of separating the test beam results into
beam action and arch action. This value is, of
course, very crude, but for the available data it
proved to be quite effective as a means of separat-
ing the wide scatter (large V.) of arch action data
from the more consistent (small V.) behavior of
the beam action data in the Eq. (2) format.
It may be remarked here, that the poor correla-
(2) tion of the variables of Eq. (1) with test data is,
to a large extent, due to the wide scatter of arch
action data.
The regression of the arch action data with a/d
below 2.5 resulted in a large unacceptable v.
value, and several attempts to remove variables
such as p, or add variables such as bond contact
(3) area ratio, did nothing to improve the prediction
precision. An investigation concerning the effect
of beam support conditions on the strength of
beams with low ajd values will be performed in a
later section.
Regression analysis for slender beams with
afd > 2.5
Let s;. be the standard deviation of the estimate
of any exponent b, in Eq. (2) ; the regression
analysis of the 151 beams with ajd > 2.5 pro
vided:
945
 k = 46.0, = 0.31, b2 = 0.37, b3 = 0.27,
b1 d/a) it was necessary to combine test results
1 13,

Ve = 9.8 percent, s1 = 0.02, s2 = 0.02,S3 = 0.03 from several different laboratory sources. Each
laboratory has its own characteristic manner of
Here the low Vc value indicates that the form of
fabricating and testing its beams, and a regression
Eq. (2) is consistent with the natural behavior of
analysis of combined laboratory data reflects
the data, and that a satisfactory prediction of the
these procedural differences in its percentage of
shear strength of slender beams is possible.
error. One of the most important of these lab-
A substantial part of Vc may be due to differ-
oratory differences is the means of identifying
ences between and within test series in the identi-
the cracking load Vcr Depending on the individ-
fication of the cracking shear V en and in the rep-
ual laboratory, Vcr might be either: the load at
resentation of the beam concrete by a companion
which the diagonal crack crossed the estimated
cylinder test of fc'. At this point, the most inter-
neutral axis; load at which a break in slope oc-
esting result is the near equality of b1, b~, and b:<
curred in the strain gage reading versus load
to the rational fraction %. This result leads to the
curve; or load at sudden diagonal tension failure.
rationalized exponent analysis in the next section.
The effect of these different identification pro-
cedures is reflected by the slope values as found
Regression analysis of
vb";J (
= k fc'
d)
p~
1/::: by the separate regression analyses of:

The results of the regression analyses of the ~d. = k ( f/ p ~ r/3

slender beam, ajd >2.5, test data in the rational-
for each of the individual laboratory sources as
ized exponent form (fc' p d/a) 1 13 are given in the given in Table 1.
following figures and related commentary.
TABLE I-COEFFICIENTS OF VARIATION FOR
Fig. 2 VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS
The satisfactory accuracy as indicated by the
Reference Number of Coefficient of variation
average percent error Ve of 9.1 percent indicates source beams Slope k of error V c, percent
that the cracking shear stress is well predicted by 1 12 64.3 4.9
the factor (fc' p dja) 1N. A substantial portion of 2 24 58.6 9.1
4 8 59.2 4.3
this percentage of error is due to different lab- 8 32 59.2 6.3
oratory test conditions and definitions. To obtain 9 63 59.2 8.5
7 9 45.1 (V") 4.1
a sufficient amount, and range of variation of test 7 9 53.1 (VDT) 6.2
data for the initial analyses leading to (fc' p 7 9 56.0 (VD7' + VnL) 6.2

E
u
ci-
"- ;,~fl
o>
.%.

(f)
a.
( 15)

~~-a
:oo~t
>..c
(f)
(f)
Q)
.... ..
(f)

> 2.5
~~s~t
.: ajd
....
0
Q) 151 BEAMS
.
(f) SLOPE= 59.0
o> Ve=9.1%
c
_;:: 0
u
0 0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0
....
u I
l
d 3 , Cyl.
( t'cP_ Str. f~ psi.
a
I
2.42 ( f~p d l/3 , Cyl. Str. f~ kg/sq.cm.
a

Fig. 2-Cracking shear stress in slender beams; {Data References I, 2, 4, 6, and 9)

.946 ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968

Commentary for Table 1
Reference 1 has high slope of 64.3 corresponding
to Vcr equal to sudden diagonal tension failure.
All of the references 2 4 8 9 have slope values
which are remarkably close to the combined data
value of 59.0, and correspond to the crack to
neutral axis definition of Vcr The low Ve values
show the close agreement with the basic equation
format for each source.
Reference 7 requires a special explanation. This
source has strain gage identification of Vcr and
this is reflected by its low slope of 45.1. The table
shows a new analysis of the sudden ultimate
=
V 11 V DT Of these beams With the higher Slope Of
53.1. Then, for these beams with very low values
of steel ratio p, it was remarked that beam dead
load contributes about 10 percent to the end shear
V of the beam at failure. When dead load was
added to this V, then the slope was raised to 56.0.
Within the range of sampling error, this value is
consistent with the slopes of the other sources.
tension stress, with slope value of 61.1, as com-
pared with the cracking shear stress slope of 59.0.
In Fig. 3 the points with special identification
apply to a later analysis of short stub beams.
Study of ultimate shear failure (Fig. 4)
For beams with ajd > 2.5, the ultimate load V ..
may range from cracking load V cr to a few per-
cent above Vcr. Any substantial increase above V,.r
or sudden V m, due to some shear compression
action, appears to be unstable and nonpredictable
in terms of beam properties.
SUMMARY OF THE STUDY OF
SLENDER BEAM SHEAR CAPACITY
The regression analysis of slender beam, a/ d >
2.5, test data has shown that beam action is a con-
sistent, stable, behavior that allows the formula-
tion of accurate prediction equations for Vcr and
VnT:
Cracking shear (151 beams)

Study of sudden diagonal tension failure (Fig. 3)

V cr/bd = 59 ( f/ p ~ ) 1/3

In order to eliminate the component of error

due to different definitions of Vcr, all beams from
all sources with recorded diagonal tension or sud-
den failure modes V nT were analyzed. It was felt
that these sudden failures were more consistently
identifiable by all observers, and the resulting
small percentage error of 8.2 percent confirms this
procedure. This analysis also provides a measure
of the average, relative magnitude of diagonal
(4)
Coefficient of variation 9.1 percent =
Some variation here is due to different methods
of identifying V,r, e.g., strain gage, visual or sud-
den failure. Also, beam dead load was not in-
cluded, and is significant in source.' It should be
noted, in Fig. 2 and 3, that there is linear behavior
over the entire range of beam property values.

~,.,

.;...o.
II)

~~al
II)

-Q)
....
CJl

....
S4~
..... x X
c
Q)
.s::: ( 15)
s 2 ____./ ..

2,~:,t
CJl
E
u
Q) C"

~~ c

TIB~
-
01
c ~
LL..
- >
ajd 2.5
'~,~~
<I)
c: 0..
0
II)
86 BEAMS
c:
Q) SLOPE=61.1
1-
Ve = 8.2 /o
c 0
c:
0 0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0
01
c I
0 ( t'cP_
d )/'3 Cyl. Str. f~ psi.
a
I
2.42 ( f~p_Q_)/3 , Cyl. Str. f~ kgjsq.cm.
a
Fig. 3-Sudden diagonal shear stress in slender beams; the five points with special identification are short lateral
stub beams and are plotted here to compare with slender beam behavior (Data References I, 2, 4, 8, and 10)

ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968 947

 :~,~+
E
u
o-
~0'
X
300!
-
Vl
a.
~
(20'1
>.o
~'-a ( 15)

~~o~t
Vl
Vl
Q)
.....
+-
(/)

.....
0
Q)
..c >
'~,~t
(/) ajd 2.5
201 BEAMS
Q)
+-
0 SLOPE = 63.4
E Ve= 10.9%
::::) 0
0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0

d )~
( f'cP_ Cyl. Str. f~ psi.
a
2 . 4 2 ( f ~ p_Q_ ).Y3 Cyl. Str. f'c kgjsq. em.
a '

Fig. 4-Uitimate shear stress in slender beams (Data References I, 2, 4-10)

E
u
c- 500
~
0>
..> {30)+
- 400. .
<f)
a.

ul" '(20'
"'+1
>.O 300
<f)
Vl
Q)
..... ( 15)
+-
(.f) 200.
.....
0
Q)
(IO)+ ajd < 2.5
..c 60 BEAMS

~~~'t
(.f)

SLOPE=61.5
0>
c::
X
Ve= 27.4%
(.)
0 0
.....
u 0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 7.0
I
d {3
( f cP_
I Cyl. Str. f~ psi.
a
I
2.42(f~pd
a
)y3, Cyl. Str. f~ kg jsq. em.
Fig. 5-Cracking shear stress in short beams; (Data References I, 2, 4, 5, 7, and 9)

948 ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968

Diagonal tension or sudden failure (86 beams)
VDr/bd=61 (f/p ~)1/3
(5)
Coefficient of variation = 8.2 percent
This mode of failure has the advantage of being
readily and consistently identifiable by all observ-
ers, and because of its accuracy of prediction, may
be the best measure of useful beam shear
strength.
Ultimate shear
Ultimate shear Vu is not a desirable quantity for
accurate prediction in long beams because of its
unstable range from 0 to 10-15 percent of Vcr
Short beam arch action (Fig. 5)
To study the effect of arch action for beams
with a/d < 2.5, V cr for these beams was compared
with the slender beam prediction Eq. ( 4). It ap-
pears that some type of cracking initiates earlier
than for beams with a/d > 2.5, but this cracking
is not indicative of failure.
Short beam arch action (Fig. 6)
The ultimate load Vu for beams with a/d < 2.5
is seen to range, in a very unstable and nonpre-
dictable manner, from the V cr line for slender
beams, as a lower bound, to very high values. This
lower bound property is interesting and is used in
the investigation of the effect of beam support
conditions on arch action in the next section.
EFFECT OF BEAM SUPPORT ON ARCH ACTION
Ferguson 16 suggests that the extra shear
strength of short beams is possibly due to the
compressive stresses, or arch action, caused by the
load and support block pressures in laboratory
test beams. To investigate this extra strength,
or rather the lack of it when load and support
pressures on the top and bottom of the beam are
not present, Ferguson performed tests on four
special short beams. These beams had lateral
stub projections at the load and support points
such that the load and support reactions could
be applied to these lateral stubs on each side
of the beam rather than to the top and bottom
surfaces of the beam. Also, following Ferguson's
suggestion, Taylor 17 constructed a series of
similar lateral stub beams, of which two beams
qualify as short beams. The shear stress at
failure of Ferguson's four beams, and Taylor's two
beams, are plotted on Fig. 3, and the special de-
tails of each test are as follows:
Ferguson's beams with afd = 1.35
82 - Load applied to lateral stubs, and support
reaction applied to bottom face of beam causing a
partial amount of compression or arch action.

1000 i 84 - Support reaction applied to lateral stubs,

and load applied to top face of beam causing a
partial amount of arch action.
900 83 - Both load and support reaction applied to
E
u (60)+ lateral stubs such that no arch action can take
800 place.
(50)1
700.
F6 - Both load and support reactions applied
to modified lateral stubs with heights not equal
to the depth of the beam. These partial height
I
<f)
0..
600.
stubs caused a tension field in the beam below
>.n
(40)t ::
the support and above the load point, and there-
"/""'
<f) 500.
fore decreased the cracking capacity of the beam.

(30)~
<f) :

-Q)
.._
( f)
400. :: .... : .
Taylor's beams
Both Beams T18 and T30 had partial lateral
.._
0
Q)
.r:; 300.
I . ......
stub heights similar to the Ferguson Beam F6
and the resulting tension fields may be the cause
(f)
(20)T of the low failure stress. Also, the small concrete
Q)
200. cover of % in. for the tension steel in these beams
0
E (10)+ may have created some loss of strength.

100 i Considering these special test conditions, which

either strengthen the beams (Beams 82 and 84),
or create weaknesses (Beams F6, T18, and T30),
0 -------------- the results of these short beam tests agree quite
0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 7.0
well with slender beam action. In particular,
I
( f ~ p_g_)-'3 Cyl. Str. t'c psi. Beam 83, without arch action or tension field
a '
weakness, has perfect agreement with slender
2.42 ( f~ p_Q_)~ Cyl. Str. f~ kg/sq. em. beam action. It would be interesting and instruc-
a ' tive to have more test data similar to Beam 83.
Fig. 6-Uitimate shear stress in short beams; (Data
Because of the limited and varied nature of the
References I, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, and 10) special stub beam data, it is not possible to draw

ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968 949

definite conclusions. However, there is an indica-
tion, 'as was first proposed by Ferguson, that the
extra shear strength of short beams, herein
termed as arch action, is due to a particular com-
bination of top and bottom pressures from beam
load and support blocks. When these top and
bottom pressures are not present, such as for
Beam 83, then the shear strength appears to be
well predicted by the slender beam Eq. ( 4) or
(5). A further indication that these slender beam
equations may apply to the nonarch action shear
strength of short beams is given by Fig. 6. Here,
the ultimate shear stress of short beams is seen to
be extremely variable, but with a lower bound
given by the line representing the slender beam
Eq. ( 4), and it is possible to formulate the follow-
ing hypothesis. For short beams, with top and
bottom load and support pressures, there may be
certain situations where these block pressures do
not combine to form the extra strength of the
arch action, and slender beam behavior [as pre-
dicted by Eq. (4) or (5)] may occur even in these
short beams with a/d < 2.5. The extra strength of
arch action appears to be not only a function of
beam properties, but also depends on the manner
of load application and beam support. Therefore,
if it is desired in future analyses, to formulate a
prediction equation for this extra strength, this
equation must contain an accurate representation
of the top and bottom pressures due to load and
support conditions. This representation might be
the dimensions of the load and support blocks or
plates and their position in the short beam shear
span. Also, some method must be given for
describing or translating the ideal laboratory con-
ditions into the load and support conditions that
occur in actual structures.
CONCLUSIONS
The regression analysis in dimensionless ratio
form of available shear failure data for simply
reinforced, simple concrete beams under concen-
trated load, has provided a means of organizing,
predicting, and comparing the different aspects of
beam shear str~ngth behavior. First, by an
analysis of data above successive afd values, it
was possible to separate the consistent, well pre-
dicted, beam action of slender beams with a/d >
2.5, from the highly variable arch action of short
beams with a/d < 2.5. It is proposed that the poor
correlation of all test data, as shown in Fig. 1,
with the ACI Code Eq. (1), is to a large extent
due to the wide dispersion of the arch action shear
stress values.
The beam action shear stress of slender beams
is closely grouped, over the wide range of beam
properties, about the prediction Eq. (4) and (5)
for cracking and sudden shear failure, and no
significantly large differences occur between pre~
950
dieted and test values for low values of p or fc'. It
should be noted in these equations, that the beam
properties of fc', p, and d/a, are each weighted by
an exponent value of %, which is markedly dif-
ferent from the weighting given to these proper-
ties by the ACI Code Eq. (1). The inability of Eq.
(1) to predict low test values, in Fig. 1, of:
bdyf/
for low values of:
P Vcrd
Myfc'
may be due to this difference in weighting of
properties.
The availability of the slender beam shear
stress prediction format, or factor, k (fc' p d/a) 1/3,
made it possible to study the relative magnitudes
of cracking stress V cr, diagonal tension or sudden
shear stress V nT, and ultimate shear stress V by
"'
a comparison of their respective slope coefficient
values k: kcr = 59.0, knT = 61.1, and ku = 63.4.
Also V" tends to have an unstable variation from
0 to 10-15 percent of Vcr The ability to predict
accurately, Vc,. or V DT, may find a useful applica-
tion in future studies concerning the influence of
web reinforcement, where this influence is the
difference between the shear strength of the
beam with web reinforcement and the beam's
predicted shear strength without web reinforce-
ment.
The analysis of the available test data for short
beams, with a/d < 2.5, and with top and bottom
load and support block pressures, did not provide
a satisfactory prediction equation for this arch
action shear strength. A study of the limited
amount of special stub beam data where the top
and bottom block pressures were not present in
short beams, provided an indication that the extra
strength of arch action does not occur in the ab-
sence of these pressures, and in this instance the
shear strength is well predicted by the slender
beam equations. Also, the slender beam equation
for cracking shear stress appears to provide a
lower bound for the arch action shear failure
stress. This lower bound behavior, for a/d < 2.5,
led to the hypothesis that there may be certain
conditions, such as the types, size, and spacing of
load, and support blocks, that do not form, or
partially form, the arch action. Therefore this
variable attainment of the extra strength of arch
action may possibly account for the high varia-
bility of short beam shear failure stress. Defin-
itely more work is required concerning the pre-
cise definition and representation of the load and
support conditions in the laboratory and in actual
structures if it is desired to predict and use the
extra shear strength of short beam arch action.
ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968
 ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The research reported in this paper was supported by
a grant from the National Science Foundation. The
author wishes to express his appreciation for the care-
ful analytical work performed by Kenneth Honda,
Yogeshwar Goel, and Roger Werne, graduate student
assistants, on this project.
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ACI JOURNAL I NOVEMBER 1968
Sinopsis- Resume- Zusammenfassung
Prediccion de Ia Resistencia al Cortante Mediante
el Analisis de Datos Existentes
Se aplica un metodo empirico el cual combina las
tecnicas del analisis dimensional y del analisis de
regreswn estatica a fuentes existentes de datos
obtenidos de ensayos a cortante de vigas de concreto
reforzado. Para vigas con aid sobre 2.5, el metodo ha
producido ecuaciones de predicci6n de esfuerzo a la
rotura de la forma v = k(fc'Pd/a)ll 3 tanto para
agrietamiento como para CO'rtante a tension diagonal
subita. Estas equaciones tienen un porcentaje bajo de
predicci6n del error para una amplia variaci6n de
propiedades y fuentes de ensayos. Los esfuerzos
cortantes a la rotura, altos pero variables, de vigas
cortas con un a/ d < 2.5 tienen un menor agarre dado
por las equaciones de predicci6n de la viga esbelta.
Ademas, vigas laterales, sin cargas en la parte superior
e inferior y recibiendo cargas de bloques, parecen tener
el comportamiento de vigas esbeltas.
Determination de Ia Resistance au Cisaillement de
Poutres pour !'Analyse de Donnees Existante
Une methode empirique qui combine les techniques
d'analyse dimensionnelles et d'analyse de regression
statistique est appliquee a des donnees resultantes
d'essais de poutres en beton arme. Pour des poutres de
rapport a/d superieur a 2,5 la methode a permis
d'etablir des equations de contrainte de rupture de la
forme v = k(fc' pd/a)ll3 ala fois pour craquelures et
tension de cisaillement diagonale. Ces equations ont un
pourcentage d'erreur d'estimation faible pour un
eventail de qualites de poutres et de resultats d'essais
importants. La contrainte elevee mais variable de
cisaillement a la rupture des poutres courtes avec un
rapport a/d < 2,5 a une valeur inferieure limite donnee
par les equations de determination de poutres minces.
Plus encore les poutres laterales courtes en porte a
faux, sans charge superieure, inferieure et sans support
de blocs de pression semblent avoir le comportement
des poutres minces.
Vorherbestimmung der Schubfestigkeit von Balken
mit Hilfe einer Auswertung existierender
Versuchsdaten
Eine empirische Methode wird dazu verwendet,
friihere Ergebnisse von Untersuchungen iiber die
Schubfestigkeit von Stahlbetonbalken auszuwerten. Die
Methode verbindet eine dimensionsgebundene Analyse
mit einer statistischen Auswertung. Fiir Balken mit
einer Schubschlankheit a/d von mehr als 2.5 ergab sich
zur Vorherbestimmung der Bruchspannung eine
Gleichung der Form v = k(fc'pd/a)11 3 Diese Beziehung
hat Giiltigkeit sowohl fiir die Risslast als auch fiir einen
plotzlichen Schubbruch. Der Fehler des .
vorherbestimmten Verhaltens ist trotz des we1ten
Bereiches der Parameter und der verschiedensten
Quellen der Versuchsdaten gering. Die hohe, aber
veranderliche Bruchschubspannung kurzer Balken mit
einer Schubschlankheit von weniger als aid< 2.5
besitzt einen unteren Grenzwert, welcher dem
Rechenwert fiir schlanke Balken entspricht. Kurze
Querbalken, bei denen die Last nicht direkt ~n
Balkenober- oder -unterseite eingetragen wird und d1e
nicht direkt aufgelagert sind, verhalten sich wie
schlanke Balken.
.951