Abstract
In this paper, experimental investigation into the behavior of reinforced concrete (RC) columns tested under large lateral displacement with four different types of loading arrangements is presented. Each loading arrangement has a different system for controlling the consistency of the loading condition. One of the loading arrangements used three units of link mechanism to control the parallelism of the top and bottom stub of column during testing, and the remaining employed eight hydraulic jacks for the same purpose. The loading systems condition used in this investigation were similar to the actual case in a moment-resisting frame where the tested column was displaced in a double curvature. Ten model column specimens, divided into four series were prepared. Two columns were tested monotonically until collapse, and unless failure took place at an earlier stage of loading, the remaining eight columns were tested under cyclic loading. Test results indicated that the proposed system to keep the top and bottom stubs parallel during testing performed well.