Design rules for steel portal frames according to EC3 and AISC360 provisions

Nowadays, it frequently happens that steel constructors design and erect civil and industrial constructions all over the world, because of the complex historical and economic dynamics of the global market: as a consequence, engineers should be familiar with the use of widely accepted steel design codes. In spite of this remark, it should result attractive a direct comparison between the design rules adopted by European (EU) and American (US) design provisions on typical framed configurations of interest for routine design. This issue is the focus of the present paper: both the EU and US codes are shortly discussed with reference to the methods proposed for design analysis. Furthermore, a numerical parametric study on portal frames is presented by varying the geometry, load conditions and degree of continuity of beam-to-column joints. Research outcomes single out main differences between the methods proposed within each code and among the codes themselves.