• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.93-112
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• 2009

In this study seismic analyses of steel structures were carried out to examine the effect of ground motion characteristics and structural properties on energy demands using 100 earthquake ground motions recorded in different soil conditions, and the results were compared with those of previous works. Analysis results show that ductility ratios and the site conditions have significant influence on input energy. The ratio of hysteretic to input energy is considerably influenced by the ductility ratio and the strong motion duration. It is also observed that as the predominant periods of the input energy spectra are significantly larger than those of acceleration response spectra used in the strength design, the strength demand on a structure designed based on energy should be checked especially in short period structures. For that reason framed structures with buckling-restrained-braces (BRBs) were designed in such a way that all the input energy was dissipated by the hysteretic energy of the BRBs, and the results were compared with those designed by conventional strength-based design procedure.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.491-506
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• 2014

Buckling-restrained braces (BRBs) have excellent hysteretic behavior while buckling-restrained braced frames (BRBFs) are susceptible to residual lateral deformations. To address this drawback, a novel self-centering (SC) BRB with Basalt fiber reinforced polymer (BFRP) composite tendons is presented in this work. The configuration and mechanics of proposed BFRP-SC-BRBs are first discussed. Then an 1840-mm-long BFRP-SC-BRB specimen is fabricated and tested to verify its hysteric and self-centering performance. The tested specimen has an expected flag-shaped hysteresis character, showing a distinct self-centering tendency. During the test, the residual deformation of the specimen is only about 0.6 mm. The gap between anchorage plates and welding ends of bracing tubes performs as expected with the maximum opening value 6 mm when brace is in compression. The OpenSEES software is employed to conduct numerical analysis. Experiment results are used to validate the modeling methodology. Then the proposed numerical model is used to evaluate the influence of initial prestress, tendon diameter and core plate thickness on the performance of BFRP-SC-BRBs. Results show that both the increase of initial prestress and tendon diameters can obviously improve the self-centering effect of BFRP-SC-BRBs. With the increase of core plate thickness, the energy dissipation is improved while the residual deformation is generated when the core plate strength exceeds initial prestress force.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.47-55
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• 2003

This study proposed a convenient seismic design procedure for buckling-restrained braced frames based on the equivalent energy concept. The design process begins with the computation of input energy from response spectrum. Then the elastic energy and plastic energy are computed based on the equal energy concept. The computed plastic energy is distributed to each story along energy distribution ratio and the cross-sectional area of each brace is computed so that all the plastic energy is dissipated by the brace. The proposed procedure was applied to the design of three-, six-, and twenty-story steel frames with buckling-restrained braces, and artificial earthquake records were used for verification of the proposed method. According to analysis results, top story displacements of the low-rise structure satisfies the given target displacement however that of the twenty-story structure was much smaller than the given target displacement.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.139-150
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• 2022

In most self-center braces, decreasing residual deformation is possible only by increasing pretension force, which results in lower energy dissipation capacity. On the other hand, increasing energy dissipation capacity means higher values of residual deformation. The goal of this research was to find the best design for a self-centering buckling restrained brace (SC-BRB) system by balancing self-centering capability and energy dissipation. Three, six, and nine-story structures were investigated using OpenSees software and the TCL programming language to achieve this goal. For each height, 62 different SC-BRBs were considered using different values for the pretension force of cables, the area of the buckling restrained brace (BRB) core plate, and the yield stress of the core plate. The residual deformation and dissipated energy of all the models were calculated using nonlinear analyses after cyclic loading was applied. The optimum design for each height was determined among all the models and was compared to the structure equipped with the usual BRB. The residual deformation of the framed buildings was significantly reduced, according to the findings. Also the reduction of the energy dissipation was acceptable. The optimum design of SC-BRB in 6-story building has the most reduction percent in residual deformation, it can reduce residual deformation of building 83% while causing only a 57% of reduction in dissipated energy. The greatest reduction in residual deformation versus dissipated energy reduction was for the optimum SC-BRB design of 9-story building, results indicated that it can reduce residual deformation of building 69% while causing only a 42% of reduction in dissipated energy.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.81 no.6
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• pp.715-728
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• 2022

A new type of buckling-restrained braces (BRBs) with a longitudinally profiled steel plate working as the core (LPBRB) is proposed and experimentally investigated. Different from conventional BRBs with a constant thickness core, both stiffness and strength of the longitudinally profiled steel core along its longitudinal direction can change through itself variable thickness, thus the construction of LPBRB saves material and reduces the processing cost. Four full-scale component tests were conducted under quasi-static cyclic loading to evaluate the seismic performance of LPBRB. Three stiffening methods were used to improve the fatigue performance of LPBRBs, which were bolt-assembled T-shaped stiffening ribs, partly-welded stiffening ribs and stiffening segment without rib. The experimental results showed LPBRB specimens displayed stable hysteretic behavior and satisfactory seismic property. There was no instability or rupture until the axial ductility ratio achieved 11.0. Failure modes included the out-of-plane buckling of the stiffening part outside the restraining member and core plate fatigue fracture around the longitudinally profiled segment. The effect of the stiffening methods on the fatigue performance is discussed. The critical buckling load of longitudinally profiled segment is derived using Euler theory. The local bulging behavior of the outer steel tube is analyzed with an equivalent beam model. The design recommendations for LPBRB are presented finally.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.451-458
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• 2008

In this study 3- and 6-story flat plate structures designed only for gravity load are retrofitted with steel plates and braces and their seismic performances are evaluated to verify the effect of seismic retrofit. According to the analysis results obtained from nonlinear static and dynamic analyses both the strength and stiffness are significantly enhanced as a result of the seismic retrofit. Especially the effect of column jacketing could be enhanced significantly when slabs were reinforced to prevent premature punching shear failure. When buckling-restrained braces are used instead of conventional braces, the structures showed more ductile behavior, especially in the 3-story structure.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.201-215
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• 2019

In this research, the behavior of tube-in-tube BRBs (TiTBRBs) has been investigated. In a typical TiTBRB, the yielding core tube is located inside the outer restraining one to dissipate energy through extensive plastic deformation, while the outer restraining tube remains essentially elastic. With the aid of FE analyses, the monotonic and cyclic behavior of the proposed TiTBRBs have been studied as individual brace elements. Subsequently, a detailed finite element model of a representative single span-single story frame equipped with such a TiTBRB has been constructed and both monotonic and cyclic behavior of the proposed TiTBRBs have been explored under the application of the AISC loading protocol at the braced frame level. With the aid of backbone curves derived from the FE analyses, a simplified frame model has been developed and verified through comparison with the results of the detailed FE model. It has been shown that, the simplified model is capable of predicting closely the cyclic behavior of the TiTBRB frame and hence can be used for design purposes. Considering type of connection detail used in a frame, the TiTBRB member which behave satisfactorily at the brace element level under cyclic loading conditions, may suffer global buckling due to the flexural demand exerted from the frame to the brace member at its ends. The proposed TiTBRB suit tubular members of offshore structures and the application of such TiTBRB in a typical offshore platform has been introduced and studied in a single frame level using detailed FE model.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.79-89
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• 2017

As a new type of energy dissipation component with excellent mechanical performance, the Buckling-Retrained Braces (BRBs) were gradually applied in retrofitting and improving seismic performance of reinforced concrete structures in China. In order to investigate the seismic performance of reinforced concrete structures retrofitted with BRBs, quasi-static test of two single-bay and 3-story reinforced concrete frames specimens was conducted and introduced in this paper. Two 1/2 scaled specimens were designed to reflect real prototype structure. For comparison, one control specimen was designed without BRBs, and the other specimen was retrofitted with BRBs. And particularly, for the specimen retrofitted with BRBs, the BRBs were eccentric layout instead of usually concentric or x-shaped layout, aiming to be more suitable for large-span frames. In the test, the failure mode, carrying capacity, deformability, ductility and energy dissipation ability of both two specimens were investigated. Based on the test results of the measured hysterical curves, skeleton curves, the seismic performances such as bearing capacity, plastic deformability, energy dissipation ability and ductility of two specimens were fully studied. And from the test results, it was indicated that the specimen retrofitted with BRBs showed much better seismic performance than the control specimen without BRBs, and the BRBs could effectively improve the seismic performance of the reinforced concrete frame. For the specimen retrofitted with BRBs, the BRBs firstly yielded before the beam-ends and the column-ends, and an expected yielding process or yielding mechanism as well as good seismic performance was obtained. For the specimens without BRBs, though the beam-ends yielded prior to the column-ends, the seismic performance was much poor than that of the specimen with BRBs.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.169-180
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• 2015

Recently, Seismic performance of the building built in the past is required to review, because the code for seismic design have been reinforced. In 2009, if the revised latest criteria of seismic design is applied, the majority the steel structure of the low-rise concentrically braced system is short of the seismic performance. Also, when the steel braces are subject to compressive load, which causes unstable behavior of the structure. In order to verify the compressive behavior of the reinforced braces, structural performance test was conducted with variables of slenderness ratio and the amount of reinforcement. Therefore, this study suggests restraining the bending buckling of slender H-shaped braces to resist compressive force. In order to verify the compressive behavior of the reinforced braces, structural performance test was conducted with variables of slenderness ratio and the amount of reinforcement.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2002.04a
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• pp.200-207
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• 2002

Energy dissipation capacity and earthquake responses of steel structures installed with unbonded braces(UB) were investigated. Nonlinear dynamic time history analyses were carried out to investigate the seismic response of multi-story model structures with UB having various size and strength. Various techniques were applied to determine proper story-wise distribution of UB in multi-story structures. The analysis results show that the maximum displacements of structures generally decrease as the stiffness of UB increases. However there are cases that the maximum displacement and accumulated damage increases as the stiffness of UB increases, which needs to be checked before deciding proper amount of UB.