• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.473-491
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• 2022

The research investigates experimentally the effect of confinement on structural behavior at the ends of beam-column in reinforced concrete (RC) frames. In the experimental study, five specimens consisting of 1/3-scaled RC frames having single-bay, representing the traditional deficiencies of existing buildings constructed without receiving proper engineering service is investigated. The RC frame specimens were produced to represent most of the existing buildings in Turkey that have damage potential. To decrease the probable damage to the existing buildings exposed to earthquakes, the carbon Textile Reinforced Mortar (TRM) strengthening technique (fully wrapping) was used on the ends of the RC frame elements to increase the energy dissipation and deformation capacity. The specimens were tested under reversed cyclic lateral loading with constant axial loads. They were constructed satisfying the weak column-strong beam condition and consisting of low-strength concrete, such as compressive strength of 15 MPa. The test results were compared and evaluated considering stiffness, strength, energy dissipation capacity, structural damping, ductility, and damage propagation in detail. Comprehensive investigations of these experimental results reveal that the strengthening of a brittle frame with fully-TRM wrapping with non-anchored was effective in increasing the stiffness, ductility, and energy dissipation capacities of RC bare frames. It was also observed that the frame-only-retrofitting with an infill wall is not enough to increase the ductility capacity. In this case, both the frame and infill wall must be retrofitted with TRM composite to increase the stiffness, lateral load carrying, ductility and energy dissipation capacities of RC frames. The presented strengthening method can be an alternative strengthening technique to enhance the seismic performance of existing or moderately damaged RC buildings.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.30 no.1C
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• pp.37-44
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• 2010

Recently, urban retrofit and extension, development of new buildings and facilities, and construction of underground structures like subway tunnels in urban areas give rise to significance of site investigation at urban areas. However, ambient electric noises, traffic vibrations, embedded objects work as obstacles to high-quality and accuracy in site investigation at urban areas. In this paper, a new technique called the pseudo-DC resistivity survey (in brief, PDC-R) was proposed to minimize the adverse effect of ambient electrical noises in resistivity survey. PDC-R technique utilizes an AC current with frequency range of 0.1 to 1.0 Hz rather than DC current, which is used for conventional resistivity survey. The motivation of using low-frequency AC current is to avoid 60-Hz components or its multiples in the resistivity survey which ambient noises are mostly composed of. The implementation of PDC-R technique also included the parametric study on skin effect, frequency effect and current-level effect, which led to the determination of optimal values of frequency and current level for PDC-R survey. The reliability and feasibility of PDC-R technique was verified through field tests, accompanied by the comparison with DC resistivity survey and CapSASW tests.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.47-55
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• 2014

As increasing number of large-size earthquake around Korean peninsula, many interests have been focused to the earthquake strengthening of existing structures. The brittle fracture of Non-seismic designed columns lead to full collapse of the building. In the past, cross-sectional extension method, a steel plate reinforcing method and fiver-reinforced method are applied to Seismic Rehabilitation Technique mainly. However, the reinforcement methods have drawbacks that induce physical damage to structures, large space, long duration time. So, in this study, performance evaluation of previously developed FRP seismic reinforcement which do not induce physical damage and short duration time was enforced. The specimens were constructed with 80% downscale. FRP seismic reinforcement are manufactured of glass fiber or aluminum plate with holes and glass fiber. From the experiment results, seismic performance of specimens which reinforced with FRP seismic reinforcement were increased.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.789-830
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• 2015

The recent re-assessment of the seismic hazard in Europe led for many regions of low to moderate seismicity to an increase in the seismic demand. As a consequence, several modern unreinforced masonry (URM) buildings, constructed with reinforced concrete (RC) slabs that provide an efficient rigid diaphragm action, no longer satisfy the seismic design check and have been retrofitted by adding or replacing URM walls with RC walls. Of late, also several new construction projects have been conceived directly as buildings with both RC and URM walls. Despite the widespread use of such construction technique, very little is known about the seismic behaviour of mixed RC-URM wall structures and codes do not provide adequate support to designers. The aim of the paper is therefore to propose a displacement-based design methodology for the design of mixed RC-URM edifices and the retrofit of URM buildings by replacing or adding selected URM walls with RC ones. The article describes also two tools developed for estimating important quantities relevant for the displacement-based design of structures with both RC and URM walls. The tools are (i) a mechanical model based on the shear-flexure interaction between URM and RC walls and (ii) an elastic model for estimating the contribution of the RC slabs to the overturning moment capacity of the system. In the last part of the article the proposed design method is verified through nonlinear dynamic analyses of several case studies. These results show that the proposed design approach has the ability of controlling the displacement profile of the designed structures, avoiding concentration of deformations in one single storey, a typical feature of URM wall structures.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.11 no.3 s.55
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• pp.43-52
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• 2007

This study suggests a method to determine optimal seismic retrofitting schemes for existing bridges based on weighting-factored evaluation. According to the recognition for potential seismic risk, various kinds of retrofitting methods are applied to improve the seismic performance of existing bridges. However, the relevant technique is not available to select optimal retrofitting scheme for bridges now. This suggested method weights five factors, structural compatibility, economic efficacy, environmental factor, consturctability and maintenance, and draws out optimal seismic retrofitting schemes. The application of the developed method to one hundred sixty existing bridges verifies the adaptability of this method. As a result, this study provides an idealized retrofitting schemes, and the suggested method could be a guideline to determine the more cost-effective and optimal retrofitting schemes for existing bridges in Korea.

• Architectural research
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.1-9
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• 2023

Structural ageing influences the structural performance in a negative way by reducing the seismic resilience of the structure which makes it a major concern around the world. Retrofitting is considered to be a pragmatic and feasible solution to address this issue. Numerous retrofitting techniques are devised by researchers over the years. The viability of using steel bracings as retrofitting component is evaluated on a G+30 storied building model designed according to ACI318-14 and ASCE 7-16. Four different types of steel bracing arrangements (V, Inverted V/ Chevron, Cross/ X, Diagonal) are assessed in the model developed in commercial nu-merical analysis software while considering both material and geometric nonlinearities. Reducing displacement and cost in the structures indicates that the design is safe and economical. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to find the best bracing system that causes minimum displacement, which indicates maximum lateral stiffness. To evaluate the seismic vulnerability of each system, incremental dynamic analysis was conducted to develop fragility curves, followed by the formation of collapse margin ratio (CMR) as stipulated in FEMA P695 and finally, a cost estimation was made for each system. The outcomes revealed that the effects of ge-ometric nonlinearity tend to evoke hazardous consequences if not considered in the structural design. Probabilistic seismic and economic probes indicated the superior performance of V braced frame system and its competency to be a germane technique for retrofitting.