Seismic performance of double-skin diagonally slotted thin-walled steel plate–concrete composite shear walls with riveted stiffeners

Cold-formed thin-walled steel plate shear walls are attractive for prefabricated construction, yet premature plate buckling and weak end anchorage remain critical barriers. This study proposes double-skin diagonally slotted thin-walled steel plate–concrete composite shear walls with riveted stiffeners. Two specimens with different shear span ratios were designed and fabricated in this study. Their deformation characteristics and failure modes under quasi-static cyclic loading were systematically observed, and key seismic indicators, including hysteretic curves, skeleton curves, stiffness degradation, strength degradation and energy dissipation capacity, were analysed. The results indicate that a smaller shear-span ratio and a larger steel-plate width can significantly enhance the load-carrying capacity, initial stiffness and energy dissipation capacity of the specimens. The riveted stiffeners with interlocking openings, together with the concrete confinement, provide effective restraint to the steel strips and suppress their local buckling. Strengthening the end connections contributes to fully mobilising the mechanical performance of the steel strips at large lateral drift levels. Based on the experimental investigation, a refined finite element model was developed using ABAQUS, and the simulation results showed good agreement with the test data. Considering the mechanical characteristics of this type of shear wall, a corresponding formula for calculating the shear capacity was proposed. Comparisons between the calculated and experimental results demonstrate that the proposed formula yields high accuracy, with errors within 15%, exhibiting favourable engineering applicability.