• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.97-107
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• 2021

A comprehensive study on seismic performance of wood frame building in hilly regions is presented. Specifically, seismic fragility assessment of a typical wood frame building at various locations of the northeast region of India are demonstrated. A three-dimensional simplified model of the wood frame building is developed with due consideration to nonlinear behaviour of shear walls under lateral loads. In doing so, a trilinear model having improved capability to capture the force-deformation behaviour of shear walls including the strength degradation at higher deformations is proposed. The improved capability of the proposed model to capture the force-deformation behaviour of shear wall is validated by comparing with the existing experimental results. The structural demand values are obtained from nonlinear time history analysis (NLTHA) of the three-dimensional wood frame model considering the effect of uncertainty due to record to record variation of ground motions and structural parameters as well. The ground motion bins necessary for NLTHA are prepared based on the identified hazard level from probabilistic seismic hazard analysis of the considered locations. The maximum likelihood estimates of the lognormal fragility parameters are obtained from the observed failure cases and the seismic fragilities corresponding to different locations are estimated accordingly. The results of the numerical study show that the wood frame constructions commonly found in the region are likely to suffer minor cracking or damage in the shear walls under the earthquake occurrence corresponding to the estimated seismic hazard level; however, poses negligible risk against complete collapse of such structures.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.179-189
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• 2021

Conditional spectra (CS) are applied to the seismic fragility assessment of a nuclear power plant (NPP) containment building for comparison with a relevant conventional uniform hazard response spectrum (UHRS). Three different control frequencies are considered in developing conditional spectra. The contribution of diverse magnitudes and epicentral distances is identified from deaggregation for the UHRS at a control frequency and incorporated into the conditional spectra. A total of 30 ground motion records are selected and scaled to simulate the probability distribution of each conditional spectra, respectively. A set of lumped mass stick models for the containment building are built considering nonlinear bending and shear deformation and uncertainty in modeling parameters using the Latin hypercube sampling technique. Incremental dynamic analysis is conducted for different seismic input models in order to estimate seismic fragility functions. The seismic fragility functions and high confidence of low probability of failure (HCLPF) are calculated for different seismic input models and analyzed comparatively.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.443-456
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• 2021

Structural design of the vertical displacements and shear strains in the earth fill (EF) dams has great importance in the structural engineering problems. Moreover, far fault earthquakes have significant seismic effects on seismic damage performance of EF dams like the near fault earthquakes. For this reason, three dimensional (3D) earthquake damage performance of Oroville dam is assessed considering different far-fault ground motions in this study. Oroville Dam was built in United States of America-California and its height is 234.7 m (770 ft.). 3D model of Oroville dam is modelled using FLAC3D software based on finite difference approach. In order to represent interaction condition between discrete surfaces, special interface elements are used between dam body and foundation. Non-reflecting seismic boundary conditions (free field and quiet) are defined to the main surfaces of the dam for the nonlinear seismic analyses. 6 different far-fault ground motions are taken into account for the full reservoir condition of Oroville dam. According to nonlinear seismic analysis results, the effects of far-fault ground motions on the nonlinear seismic settlement and shear strain behaviour of Oroville EF dam are determined and evaluated in detail. It is clearly seen that far-fault earthquakes have very significant seismic effects on the settlement-shear strain behaviour of EF dams and these earthquakes create vital important seismic damages on the swelling behaviour of dam body surface. Moreover, it is proposed that far-fault ground motions should not be ignored while modelling EF dams.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.485-498
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• 2022

In near-fault earthquake prone areas, the velocity pulse-like seismic waves often results in excessive horizontal displacement for structures, which may result in severe structural failure during large or near-fault earthquakes. The recently developed isolator-gap damper (IGD) systems provide a solution for the large horizontal displacement of long period base-isolated structures. However, the hysteresis characteristics of the IGD system are significantly different from the traditional hysteretic behavior. At present, the hysteretic behavior is difficult to be reflected in the structural analysis and performance evaluation especially under random earthquake excitations for lacking of effective analysis models which prevent the application of this kind of IGD system. In this paper, we propose a mathematical hysteretic model for the IGD system that presents its nonlinear hysteretic characteristics. The equivalent linearization is conducted on this nonlinear model, which requires the variances of the IGD responses. The covariance matrix for the responses of the structure and the IGD system is obtained for random earthquake excitations represented by the Kanai-Tajimi spectrum by solving the Lyapunov equation. The responses obtained by the equivalent linearization are verified in comparison with the nonlinear responses by the Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) analysis for random earthquake excitations.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.95-107
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• 2022

This paper introduces a novel, rigorous, and efficient probabilistic methodology for the performance-based optimal design (PBOD) of semi-active tuned mass damper (SATMD) for seismically excited nonlinear structures. The proposed methodology is consistent with the modern performance-based earthquake engineering framework and aims to design reliable control systems. To this end, an optimization problem has been defined which considers the parameters of control systems as design variables and minimization of the probability of exceeding a targeted structural performance level during the lifetime as an objective function with a constraint on the failure probability of stroke length damage state associated with mass damper mechanism. The effectiveness of the proposed methodology is illustrated through a numerical example of performance analysis of an eight-story nonlinear shear building frame with hysteretic bilinear behavior. The SATMD with variable stiffness and damping have been designed separately with different mass ratios. Their performance has been compared with that of uncontrolled structure and the structure controlled with passive TMD in terms of probabilistic demand curves, response hazard curves, fragility curves, and exceedance probability of performance levels during the lifetime. Numerical results show the effectiveness, simplicity, and reliability of the proposed PBOD method in designing SATMD with variable stiffness and damping for the nonlinear frames where they have reduced the exceedance probability of the structure up to 49% and 44%, respectively.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.409-436
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• 2014

Although it is widely accepted that the interaction -between masonry infill and structural members significantly affects the seismic response of reinforced concrete (RC) frames, this interaction is generally neglected in current design-oriented seismic analyses of structures. Moreover, the role of masonry infill is expected to be even more relevant in the case of existing frames designed only for gravitational loads, as infill walls can significantly modify both lateral strength and stiffness. However, the additional contribution to both strength and stiffness is often coupled to a modification of the global collapse mechanisms possibly resulting in brittle failure modes, generally related to irregular distributions of masonry walls throughout the frame. As a matter of principle, accurate modelling of masonry infill should be at least carried out by adopting nonlinear 2D elements. However, several practice-oriented proposals are currently available for modelling masonry infill through equivalent (nonlinear) strut elements. The present paper firstly outlines some of the well-established models currently available in the scientific literature for modelling infill panels in seismic analyses of RC frames. Then, a parametric analysis is carried out in order to demonstrate the consequences of considering such models in nonlinear static and dynamic analyses of existing RC structures. Two bay-frames with two-, three- and four-storeys are considered for performing nonlinear analyses aimed at investigating some critical aspects of modelling masonry infill and their effects on the structural response. Particularly, sensitivity analyses about specific parameters involved in the definition of the equivalent strut models, such as the constitutive force-displacement law of the panel, are proposed.

• International Journal of Concrete Structures and Materials
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.111-121
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• 2012

The research presented in this paper analytically examines the fire performance of flat plate buildings. The modeling parameters for the mechanical and thermal properties of materials are calibrated from relevant test data to minimize the uncertainties involved in analysis. The calibrated models are then adopted to perform a nonlinear finite element simulation on a flat plate building subjected to fire. The analysis examines the characteristics of slab deflection, in-plane deformation, membrane force, bending moment redistribution, and slab rotational deformation near the supporting columns. The numerical simulation enables the understanding of structural performance of flat plate under elevated temperature and, more importantly, identifies the high risk of punching failure at slab-column connections that may trigger large-scale failure in flat plate structures.

• Computational Structural Engineering
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.79-85
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• 1988

The inverse algorithm of Point-Fitted Paraboloid Approximation is derived and used in reliability-based calculations. The algorithm of Reliability- Conditioned method is modified in the calculation of failure points such that nonlinear performance functions can be treated in like manner as linear cases without new formulations. SOSM/RC combined method results in probability of failure closed to specified one, and partial safety factors become nearly constant for a wide range of load ratio.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.463-477
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• 2014

The modelling approach in the case of connections in precast buildings is specific. The assembly of the constitutive parts of the connection requires the inclusion of contact definitions in the model. In addition, the material non-linearity including the influence of the spatial stress distribution should be taken into account where appropriate. Here a complex model of a beam-to-column dowel connection is presented. Experiments on the analysed connection were performed within the framework of the European project SAFECAST (Performance of Innovative Mechanical Connections in Precast Building Structures under Seismic Conditions). Several material and interaction parameters were investigated and the influence of each of them was evaluated. The set of parameters which gave the best match with the experiments was chosen.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Industry Convergence
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.149-155
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• 2007

Damage assessment and Damage index for RC members failed in flexure was investigated by using the nonlinear finite element analysis, included with nonlocal constitutive law, which is analyzed for the localization of the failure on the post-peak region. In the nonlcal constitutive law, The local strains obtained at gauss points were averaged over a particular length, i.e. characteristic length and it was used to evaluate the damage of RC column member. As the analysis results, The value of nonlocal strain shows less mesh sensibility. In the damage assessment, It was confirmed that evaluations of damage of RC member were able to use nonlocal compressive strain on a cover concrete and a core concrete of the member. Moreover it was confirmed that damage process for the statically indeterminate structure was able to evaluate the damage context of the component members of the structure.