The axial bearing properties of cold-formed steel U-section short columns are investigated in this paper, including 12 columns with four types of lengths i.e.300 mm, 360 mm, 420 mm, and 450 mm. Then finite element models (FEM) were developed to simulate the experimental specimens and compared with the test results to guarantee the rationality of FEM. Moreover, the width-to-thickness and the height-to-thickness of CFS U-section short columns were examined by FEM. An approach to accurately

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... the ultimate capacity of CFS U-section short columns was proposed and certified by a large number of experimental and numerical simulation data, in order to remedy the deficiency that the direct strength method (DSM) has a large error in calculating the ultimate capacity of CFS U-section short columns. Specifically, this paper not only clarified the proposed method depending on the DSM for calculating the ultimate capacity of the CFS U-section columns but also provides reference for practical engineering design and application.