• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제71권2호
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• pp.109-118
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• 2019

This paper presents the numerical simulation of membrane structure under impact load. Firstly, the numerical simulation model is validated by comparing with the test in Hao's research. Then, the effects of the shape of the projectile, the membrane prestress and the initial impact speed, are investigated for studying the dynamic response and failure mechanism, based on the membrane displacement, projectile acceleration and kinetic energy. Finally, the results show that the initial speed and the punch shape are related with the loss of kinetic energy of projectiles. Meanwhile, the membrane prestress is an important factor that affects the energy dissipation capacity and the impact resistance of membrane structures.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• 제17권6호
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• pp.515-525
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• 2019

The calculation of active earth pressure behind retaining wall is a typical three-dimensional (3D) problem with spatial effects. With the help of limit analysis, this paper firstly deduces the internal energy dissipation power equations and various external forces power equations of the 3D retaining wall under the nonlinear strength condition, such as to establish the work-energy balance equation. The pseudo-static method is used to consider the effect of earthquake on active earth pressure in horizontal state. The failure mode is a 3D curvilinear cone failure mechanism. For the different width of the retaining wall, the plane strain block is inserted in the symmetric plane. By optimizing all parameters, the maximum value of active earth pressure is calculated. In order to verify the validity of the new expressions obtained by the paper, the solutions are compared with previously published solutions. Agreement shows that the new expressions are effective. The results of different parameters are given in the forms of figures to analysis the influence caused by nonlinear strength parameters.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제69권6호
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• pp.651-665
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• 2019

Past earthquakes have shown that appropriately designed and detailed buildings with shear walls have great performance such a way that a considerable portion of inelastic energy dissipation occurs in these structural elements. A plastic hinge is fundamentally an energy diminishing means which decrease seismic input energy through the inelastic deformation. Plastic hinge development in a RC shear wall in the areas which have plastic behavior depends on the ground motions characteristics as well as shear wall details. One of the most generally used forms of structural walls is flanged RC wall. Because of the flanges, these types of shear walls have large in-plane and out-of-plane stiffness and develop high shear stresses. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to evaluate the main characteristics of these structural components and provide a more comprehensive expression of plastic hinge length in the application of performance-based seismic design method and promote the development of seismic design codes for shear walls. In this regard, the effects of axial load level, wall height, wall web and flange length, as well as various features of earthquakes, are examined numerically by finite element methods and the outcomes are compared with consistent experimental data. Based on the results, a new expression is developed which can be utilized to determine the length of plastic hinge area in the flanged RC shear walls.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제68권5호
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• pp.621-632
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• 2018

Soft-story buildings have bottom stories much less rigid than the top stories and are susceptible to earthquake damage. Therefore, the seismic design specifications need strict design considerations in such cases. In this paper, a four-story building was investigated as a case study and the effects of X-braces elimination in its lower stories studied. In addition, the possibility of replacement of the X-braces in soft-stories with equivalent moment resisting frame inspected in two different phases. In first phase, the stiffness of X-braces and equivalent moment-resisting frames evaluated using classic equations. In final phase, diagonals removed from the lowest story to develop a soft-story and replaced with moment resisting frames. Then, the seismic stiffness variation of moment-resisting frame evaluated using nonlinear static and dynamic analyses. The results show that substitution of braced frames with an equivalent moment-resisting frame of the same stiffness increases story drift and reduces energy absorption capacity. However, it is enough to consider the needs of building codes, even using equivalent moment resisting frame instead of X-Braces, to avoid soft-story stiffness irregularity in seismic design of buildings. Besides, soft-story development in the second story may be more critical under strong ground excitations, because of interaction of adjacent stories.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제16권6호
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• pp.757-769
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• 2019

The seismic performance of a coupled shear wall system is governed by the shear resistances of its coupling beams. The plate-reinforced composite (PRC) coupling beam is a newly developed form of coupling beam that exhibits high deformation and energy dissipation capacities. In this study, the shear capacity of plate-reinforced composite coupling beams was investigated. The shear strengths of PRC coupling beams with low span-to-depth ratios were calculated using a softened strut-and-tie model. In addition, a shear mechanical model and calculating method were established in combination with a multi-strip model. Furthermore, a simplified formula was proposed to calculate the shear strengths of PRC coupling beams with low span-to-depth ratios. An analytical model was proposed based on the force mechanism of the composite coupling beam and was proven to exhibit adequate accuracy when compared with the available test results. The comparative results indicated that the new shear model exhibited more reasonable assessment accuracy and higher reliability. This method included a definite mechanical model and reasonably reflected the failure mechanisms of PRC coupling beams with low span-to-depth ratios not exceeding 2.5.

• 한국공간구조학회논문집
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• 제20권4호
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• pp.131-139
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• 2020

In this paper, the hybrid prefabricated retrofit method is suggested and examined. Six specimens were manufactured in order to evaluate their flexural performance of RC beams. Test parameters include the added beam depth, the thickness of bottom plate, the number of the steel plate with openings. The effects of these parameters on the flexural performance of reinforced concrete beams were examined. The load-deflection behavior and modes of cracks are presented from the test results. At the test result, the flexural capacity and the ductility of the hybrid prefabricated retrofit method was increased satbly. Also, comparing the flexural performance of RC beam and retrofitted RC beams, it was increased that the flexural strength is about 3.3 times, the ductility is about 2.55 times, and energy dissipation capacity is about 7.34 times.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제19권6호
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• pp.459-469
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• 2020

An external prestressed steel-bar truss unit was developed as a new strengthening technology to enhance the seismic performance of an in-plane masonry wall structure while taking advantage of the benefits of a prestressed system. The presented method consists of six steel bars: two prestressed vertical bars to introduce a prestressing force on the masonry wall, two diagonal bars to resist shear deformation, and two horizontal bars to maintain the configuration. To evaluate the effects of this new technique, four full-scale specimens, including a control specimen, were tested under combined loadings that included constant-gravity axial loads and cyclic lateral loads. The experimental results were analyzed in terms of the shear strength, initial stiffness, dissipated energy, and strain history. The efficiency of the external prestressed steel-bar truss unit was validated. In particular, a retrofitted specimen with an axial load level of 0.024 exhibited a more stable post behavior and higher energy dissipation than a control specimen with an observed complete sliding failure. The four vertical bars of the adjacent retrofitting units created a virtual column, and their strain values did not change until they reached the peak shear strength. The shear capacity of the masonry wall structure with external prestressed steel-bar truss units could be predicted using the model suggested by Yang et al.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제83권6호
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• pp.811-824
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• 2022

Despite its disadvantages, soft story can reduce the damage to the upper floors by concentrating drift in that specific story provided that large drifts are avoided. Gapped-Inclined Brace (GIB) with reduced P-delta effects and the control of soft story stiffness makes it possible to take advantage of the soft story in buildings and increase their capacity for energy dissipation. OpenSees software is used in this study to validate and modify the GIB model's shortcomings. Also, the analysis method for this element is changed for design. The modified element is evaluated in 3D analysis. Finally, to retrofit an existing building, this element is used. Based on the Iranian seismic code, a six-story reinforced concrete building is modelled and studied with 3D analysis. In this building, the construction shortcomings and elimination of infills on the ground floor cause the formation of a soft story. Results of nonlinear static analysis, nonlinear dynamic, and incremental dynamic analysis using both components of seismic acceleration applied to the structure at different angles and the fragility curves indicate the improvement of the retrofitted structure's performance using the modified element to reach the required performance level following the retrofit code.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제22권2호
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• pp.203-218
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• 2022

In this paper, quasi-static tests were carried out on three prefabricated reinforced concrete column-steel beam (RCS) sub-assemblages with floor slabs and one comparison specimen without floor slab. The effects of axial compression and floor slab on the seismic performance were studied, and finite element simulations were conducted using ABAQUS. The results showed that the failure of prefabricated RCS sub-assemblages with floor occurred as a joint beam and column failure mode, while failure of sub-assemblages without floor occurred due to beam plastic hinge formation. Compared to the prefabricated RCS sub-assemblages without floor slab, the overall stiffness of the sub-assemblages with floor slab was between 19.2% and 45.4% higher, and the maximum load bearing capacity increased by 26.8%. However, the equivalent viscosity coefficient was essentially unchanged. When the axial compression ratio increased from 0.24 to 0.36, the hysteretic loops of the sub-assemblages with floor became fuller, and the load bearing capacity, ductility, and energy dissipation capacity increased by 12.1%, 12.9% and 8.9%, respectively. Also, the initial stiffness increased by 10.2%, but the stiffness degradation accelerated. The proportion of column drift caused by beam end plastic bending and column end bending changed from 35% and 46% to 47% and 36%, respectively. Comparative finite element analyses indicated that the numerical simulation outcomes agreed well with the experimental results.

• Wind and Structures
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• 제35권2호
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• pp.131-146
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• 2022

Tornadic wind flow is inherently turbulent. A turbulent wind flow is characterized by fluctuation of the velocity in the flow field with time, and it is a dynamic process that consists of eddy formation, eddy transportation, and eddy dissipation due to viscosity. Properly modeling turbulence significantly increases the accuracy of numerical simulations. The lack of a clear and detailed comparison between turbulence models used in tornadic wind flows and their effects on tornado induced pressure demonstrates a significant research gap. To bridge this research gap, in this study, two representative turbulence modeling approaches are applied in simulating real-world tornadoes to investigate how the selection of turbulence models affects the simulated tornadic wind flow and the induced pressure on structural surface. To be specific, LES with Smagorinsky-Lilly Subgrid and k-ω are chosen to simulate the 3D full-scale tornado and the tornado-structure interaction with a building present in the computational domain. To investigate the influence of turbulence modeling, comparisons are made of velocity field and pressure field of the simulated wind field and of the pressure distribution on building surface between the cases with different turbulence modeling.