• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.365-384
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• 2014

The intensity of a ground motion can be measured by a number of parameters, some of which might exhibit robust correlations with the damage of structures subjected to that motion. In this study, 204 near-fault pulse-type records are selected and their seismic parameters are determined. Time history and damage analyses of a tested 3-storey reinforced concrete frame representing for low-rise reinforced concrete buildings subjected to those earthquake motions are performed after calibration and comparison with the available experimental results. The aim of this paper is to determine amongst several available seismic parameters, the ones that have strong correlations with the structural damage measured by a damage index and the maximum inter-story drift. The results show that Velocity Spectrum Intensity is the leading parameter demonstrating the best correlation, followed by Housner Intensity, Spectral Acceleration and Spectral Displacement. These seismic parameters are recommended as reliable parameters of near-fault pulse-type motions related to damage potential of low-rise reinforced concrete structures. The results also reaffirm that the conventional and widely used parameter of Peak Ground Acceleration does not exhibit a good correlation with the structural damage.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.46 no.4
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• pp.487-504
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• 2013

In the present work a new friction device, with a set of single or double rotational friction flanges and a link element, is described and tested. The mechanism may be applied for the strengthening of existing r/c or steel buildings as well as in new constructed buildings. The device has selectable variable behavior in different levels of displacement and an interlock mechanism that is provided by the link element. The link element may be designed to lock at preselected level of displacement, offering in this way an extra safety reserve against strong earthquakes. A summary of the existing literature about other similar mechanisms is initially presented in this paper. The proposed mechanism is presented and described in details. Laboratory experiments are presented in detail and the resulted response that proves the efficiency of the mechanism at selectable levels of strength capacity is discussed. Drawings of the mechanism attached to a r/c frame with connection details are also included. Finally a dynamic analysis of two r/c frames, with and without the proposed mechanism attached, is performed and the resulted response is given. The main conclusion is that the proposed mechanism is a cheap and efficient devise for the improvement of the performance of new or existing framed buildings to seismic loads.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.211-220
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• 2017

Observations from past strong earthquakes revealed that near-fault ground motions could lead to the failure, or even collapse of electricity transmission towers which are vital components of an overhead electric power delivery system. For assessing the performance and robustness, a high-fidelity three-dimension finite element model of a long span transmission tower-line system is established with the consideration of geometric nonlinearity and material nonlinearity. In the numerical model, the Tian-Ma-Qu material model is utilized to capture the nonlinear behaviours of structural members, and the cumulative damage D is defined as an index to identify the failure of members. Consequently, incremental dynamic analyses (IDAs) are conducted to study the collapse fragility, damage positions, collapse margin ratio (CMR) and dynamic robustness of the transmission towers by using twenty near-fault ground motions selected from PEER. Based on the bending and shear deformation of structures, the collapse mechanism of electricity transmission towers subjected to Chi-Chi earthquake is investigated. This research can serve as a reference for the performance of large span transmission tower line system subjected to near-fault ground motions.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.81-95
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• 2019

The unexpected seismic interaction of dry-assembled precast concrete frame structures typical of the European heritage with their precast cladding panels brought to extensive failures of the panels during recent earthquakes due to the inadequateness of their connection systems. Following this recognition, an experimental campaign of cyclic and pseudo-dynamic tests has been performed at ELSA laboratory of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission on a full-scale prototype of precast structure with vertical and horizontal cladding panels within the framework of the Safecladding project. The panels were connected to the frame structure by means of innovative arrangements of fastening systems including isostatic, integrated and dissipative. Many of the investigated configurations involved a strong frame-cladding interaction, modifying the structural behaviour of the frame turning it into highly non-linear since small deformation. In such cases, properly modelling the connections becomes fundamental in the framework of a design by non-linear dynamic analysis. This paper presents the peculiarities of the numerical models of precast frame structures equipped with the various cladding connection systems which have been set to predict and simulate the experimental results from pseudo-dynamic tests. The comparison allows to validate the structural models and to derive recommendations for a proper modelling of the different types of existing and innovative cladding connection systems.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.533-546
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• 2019

This study presents an experimental investigation on six beam-column joint specimens under the lateral cyclic loading. The aim was to explore the effectiveness of steel fiber-reinforced concrete (SFRC) in reducing the transverse shear stirrups in beam-column joints of the reinforced concrete (RC) frames with strong-columns and weak-beams. Two RC and four SFRC specimens with different types of reinforcement detailing and steel fibers of volume fraction in the range of 0.75-1.5% were tested under gradually increasing cyclic displacements. The main parameters investigated were lateral load-resisting capacity, hysteresis response, energy dissipation capacity, stiffness degradation, viscous damping variation, and mode of failure. Test results showed that the diagonally bent configuration of beam longitudinal bars in the beam-column joints resulted in the shear failure at the joint region against the flexural failure of beams having straight bar configurations. However, all SFRC specimens exhibited similar lateral strength, energy dissipation potential and mode of failure even in the absence of transverse steel in the beam-column joints. Finally, a methodology has been proposed to compute the shear strength of SFRC beam-column joints under the lateral loading condition.

• International journal of steel structures
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.1464-1469
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• 2018

Steel frames with ductile connections have good seismic performance under strong earthquake, they are now popular for high seismic design. In order to simplify the process of numerical analysis of the steel frames with ductile connections, simplified connection models are introduced, two types of springs are placed in the simplified connection model, which can simulate deformation of the panel zone and members. 6-story-3-bay steel frames with ductile connections are simplified and carried out modal analysis, fundamental periods of the frames predicted by finite-element analysis for simplified steel frame models were compared to the results for actual frame models. 2-story steel frame with reduced beam section connections is simplified and carried out pseudo-static analysis, hysteretic curves and skeleton curves of the frame obtained by finite-element analysis for simplified steel frame model are compared to test results. The comparison show that the difference between them is small, it is reliable and effective to predict mechanical properties of the steel frame with ductile connection by finite-element analysis of simplified steel frame model.

• International Journal of High-Rise Buildings
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.157-170
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• 2022

This paper explains about structural planning and structural design of the high-rise building in Toranomon-Azabudai Project (A Block) which is now under construction. The building is about 330 meters high, has 4.2 aspect ratio, and the outline of the building has shallow curve. We adopted seismic response control structure. The building is a steel rigid frame structure with braces, and it has enough stiffness to obtain its primary natural period to be less than about seven seconds, in consideration of wind response, seismic response and inhabitability for the wind shaking. In terms of business continuity plan, the building has a high seismic performance; value of story drift angle shall be 1/150 or less and members of the building remain almost undamaged while or after a large earthquake. Active mass dumper shall be installed at the top of the building to improve inhabitability while strong wind is blowing.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.105-111
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• 2006

Earthquake strong motion recordings from two deeply embedded sites with instrumented structures and free-field accelerographs are used to evaluate variations between foundation-level and free-field ground motions. The foundation free-field ground motion variations are quantified in terms of frequency-dependent transmissibility function amplitude, ${\mid}H\mid$. Comparisons are then performed with an analytical model for the assumed conditions of a rigid base slab and a vertically propagating, coherent incident wave. The limiting assumptions of the model are not strictly satisfactory for actual structures, and the results of the analysis reflect not only incoherence effects, but also possible foundation flexibility and wave inclination effects. Nonetheless, the simple analytical model is in an acceptable agreement with the empirical analysis and appears to be applicable in practice.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.467-488
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• 2023

Seismic retrofit of an existing steel-reinforced concrete hospital building that features innovative use of a continuous energy-dissipative steel column (CEDC) system is presented in this paper. The special system has been adopted to provide an efficient solution taking into account the difficulties of applying traditional intervention techniques to minimize the impact on architectural functionality and avoid the loss of building function and evacuation during the retrofit implementation. The lateral stiffness and strength of the CEDC system were defined based on the geometric and mechanical properties of the steel strip dampers. The hysteretic behavior under cyclic loadings was defined using a simplified numerical model. Its effectiveness was validated by comparing the results of full-scale experimental data available from the literature. All the main design considerations of the retrofitting plan are described in detail. The effectiveness of the proposed retrofitting system was demonstrated by nonlinear time-history analyses under different sets of earthquake-strong ground motions. The analysis results show that the CEDC system is effective in controlling the deformation pattern and significantly reducing damage to the existing structure during major earthquakes.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.37 no.6
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• pp.539-554
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• 2024

This study explores development of prediction model for seismic site classification through the integration of machine learning techniques with horizontal-to-vertical spectral ratio (HVSR) methodologies. To improve model accuracy, the research employs outlier detection methods and, synthetic minority over-sampling technique (SMOTE) for data balance, and evaluates using seven machine learning models using seismic data from KiK-net. Notably, light gradient boosting method (LGBM), gradient boosting, and decision tree models exhibit improved performance when coupled with SMOTE, while Multiple linear regression (MLR) and Support vector machine (SVM) models show reduced efficacy. Outlier detection techniques significantly enhance accuracy, particularly for LGBM, gradient boosting, and voting boosting. The ensemble of LGBM with the isolation forest and SMOTE achieves the highest accuracy of 0.91, with LGBM and local outlier factor yielding the highest F1-score of 0.79. Consistently outperforming other models, LGBM proves most efficient for seismic site classification when supported by appropriate preprocessing procedures. These findings show the significance of outlier detection and data balancing for precise seismic soil classification prediction, offering insights and highlighting the potential of machine learning in optimizing site classification accuracy.