• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.505-514
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• 2021

A formulation based on structural reliability and cost effectiveness is proposed to provide recommendations to select the best retrofit strategy for schools with reinforced concrete frames and masonry walls, among three proposed alternatives. The cost calculation includes the retrofit cost and the expected costs of failure consequences. Also, the uncertainty of the seismic hazard is considered for each school site. The formulation identifies the potential failure modes, among shear and bending forces for beams, and flexure-compression forces for columns, for each school, and the seismic damages suffered by the schools after the earthquake of September 17, 2017 are taken into account to calibrate the damaged conditions per school. The school safety level is measured through its global failure probability, instead of only the local failure probability. The proposed retrofit alternatives are appraised in terms of the cost/benefit balance under future earthquakes, for the respective site seismic hazard, as opposed to the current practice of just restoring the structure original resistance. The best retrofit is the one that corresponds to the minimum value of the expected life cycle cost. The study, with further developments, may be used to develop general recommendations to retrofit schools located at seismic zones.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.17 no.5 s.89
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• pp.727-734
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• 2005

High-rise residential buildings these days tend to adopt a building frame system as primary earthquake resisting structural system for some architectural reasons. But there exist several ambiguities in designing such building frame systems according to current codes with regards to : the effective stiffness property of RC cracked section in static and dynamic analyses, analytical model to evaluate story drift ratio, and deformation compatibility requirements of frames. The comparative study for these issues by appling KBC 2005 to a typical building frame system shows that demands of member strength and story drift ratio can be different significantly depending on engineer's Interpretation and application of code requirements. And a building frame system can be noneconomical, compared with the dual system, because of higher demands on strength or ductility in both frames and shear walls.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.157-174
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• 2020

The in-situ pushover test differs from the shake-table test because it is performed outdoors and thus its size is not restricted by space, which allows us to test a full-size building. However, to build a new full-size building for the test is not economical, consequently scholars around the world usually make scale structures or full-scale component units to be tested in the laboratory. However, if in-situ pushover tests can be performed on full-size structures, then the seismic behaviors of buildings during earthquakes can be grasped. In view of this, this study conducts two in-situ pushover tests of reinforced concrete (RC) buildings. One is a masonry-infilled RC building with openings (the openings ratio of masonry infill wall is between 24% and 51%) and the other is an RC building without masonry infill. These two in-situ pushover tests adopt obsolescent RC buildings, which will be demolished, to conduct experiment and successfully obtain seismic capacity curves of the buildings. The test results are available for the development or verification of a seismic evaluation model. This paper uses ASCE 41-17 as the main evaluation model and is accompanied by a simplified pushover analysis, which can predict the seismic capacity curves of low-rise buildings in Taiwan. The predicted maximum base shear values for masonry-infilled RC buildings with openings and for RC buildings without masonry infill are, respectively, 69.69% and 87.33% of the test values. The predicted initial stiffness values are 41.04% and 100.49% of the test values, respectively. It can be seen that the ASCE 41-17 evaluation model is reasonable for the RC building without masonry infill walls. In contrast, the analysis result for the masonry infilled RC building with openings is more conservative than the test value because the ASCE 41-17 evaluation model is limited to masonry infill walls with an openings ratio not exceeding 40%. This study suggests using ASCE 41-17's unreinforced masonry wall evaluation model to simulate a masonry infill wall with an openings ratio greater than 40%. After correction, the predicted maximum base shear values of the masonry infilled RC building with openings is 82.60% of the test values and the predicted initial stiffness value is 67.13% of the test value. Therefore, the proposed method in this study can predict the seismic behavior of a masonry infilled RC frame with large openings.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.287-306
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• 2002

The assessment of structural performance of transfer structures under potential seismic actions is presented. Various seismic assessment methodologies are used, with particular emphasis on the accurate modelling of the higher mode effects and the potential development of a soft storey effect in the mega-columns below the transfer plate (TP) level. Those methods include response spectrum analysis (RSA), manual calculation, pushover analysis (POA) and equivalent static load analysis (ESA). The capabilities and limitations of each method are highlighted. The paper aims, firstly, to determine the appropriate seismic assessment methodology for transfer structures using these different approaches, all of which can be undertaken with the resources generally available in a design office. Secondly, the paper highlights and discusses factors influencing the response behaviour of transfer structures, and finally provides a general indication of their seismic vulnerability. The representative Hong Kong building considered in this paper utilises a structural system with coupled shear walls and moment resisting portal-frames, above and below the TP, respectively. By adopting the wind load profile stipulated in the Code of Practice on Wind Effects: Hong Kong-1983, all the structural members are sized and detailed according to the British Standards BS8110 and the current local practices. The seismic displacement demand for the structure, when built on either rock or deep soil sites, was determined in a companion paper. The lateral load-displacement characteristic of the building, determined herein from manual calculation, has indicated that the poor ductility (brittle nature) of the mega-columns, due mainly to the high level of axial pre-compression as found from the analysis, cannot be effectively alleviated solely by increasing the quantity of confinement stirrups. The interstorey drift demands at lower and upper zones caused by seismic actions are found to be substantially higher than those arising from wind loads. The mega-columns supporting the TP and the coupling beams at higher zones are identified to be the most vulnerable components under seismic actions.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.95-102
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• 2017

This paper describes the experimental results for the structural performance of full-scale coupling beams with different reinforcement layout (diagonal and horizontal). For the reinforcements of the coupling beams, high-strength steel bars(SD500 and SD600) were used in order to improve workability and economic feasibility. The rigid steel frames and linked joints were used to maintain the clear span length (distance between both shear walls) of the coupling beam during the cyclic loading. Experimental results indicated that the diagonally reinforced coupling beam specimen could exhibit more ductile behavior compared to horizontally reinforced specimen. ACI318-14 code is applicable to design of coupling beam with diagonally reinforcement, however, that is overestimating the strength of horizontally reinforced coupling beam. It is remarkable that effective elastic stiffness values of both reinforcement details coupling beam significantly lees than ASCE 41-13.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.293-300
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• 2015

In this study, a series of forced vibration testing and ambient vibration measurement were performed at a lowrise masonry-infilled reinforced concrete frame structure before and after seismic retrofit and its dynamic properties were extracted using system identification techniques. Also, analytical models which show similar dynamic properties to the measures ones were constructed. The system identification results showed that damping ratios in x direction along which the dampers were installed has been increased. From the comparison between the analytical models, the effective stiffness of post-installed member and post-reinforced members(shear walls and damper frames) were only 50% of gross sectional stiffness of the members, which indicates that the these members were not fully integrated with the existing structure or members. In addition, support condition of post-installed footing has to be pinned in y direction to match the dynamic properties, which is seemingly caused by the change of fixity of the soil due to the installation of new footing.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.35-41
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• 2008

In general, flat plate systems have been used as a gravity load resisting system (GLRS) in building. Thus, this system should be constructed with lateral force resisting system (LFRS) such as shear walls and brace frames. GLRS should retain the ability to undergo the lateral drift associated with the LFRS without loss of gravity load carrying capacity. And flat plate system can be designed LFRS as ordinary moment frame with the special details. Thus, flat plate system designed as GLRS or LFRS should be considered internal forces (e.g., unbalanced moments) and lateral deformation generated in vicinity of slab joints render the system more susceptible to punching shear. ACI 318 (2005) allows the direct design method, equivalent frame method under gravity loads and allows the finite-element models, effective beam width models, and equivalent frame models under lateral loads. These analysis methods can produce widely different result, and each has advantage and disadvantages. Thus, it is sometimes difficult for a designer to select an appropriate analysis method and interpret the results for design purposes. This study is to help designer selecting analysis method for flat plate system and to verify practicality of the modified equivalent frame method under lateral loads. This study compared internal force and drift obtained from frame methods with those obtained from finite element method under gravity and lateral loads. For this purposes, 7 story building is considered. Also, the accuracy of these models is verified by comparing analysis results using frame methods with published experimental results of NRC slab.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.711-722
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• 2011

Beam-column gravity or Intermediate Moment frames subjected to unexpected large displacements are vulnerable when no seismic details are provided, which is typical. Conversely, economic efficiency of those frames is decreased if unnecessary special detailing is applied as the beam and column size becomes quite large and steel congestion is caused by joint transverse reinforcement in beam-column connections. Moderate seismic design is used in Korea for beam-column connections of buildings with structural walls, which are to be destroyed when the unexpected large earthquake occurs. Nonetheless, performance of such beamcolumn connections may be substantially improved by the addition of steel fibers. This study was conducted to investigate the effect of steel fibers in reinforced concrete exterior beam-column connections and possibility for the replacement of some joint transverse reinforcement. Ten half-scale beam-column connections with non-seismic details were tested under cyclic loads with two cycles at each drift up to 19 cycles. Main test parameters used were the volume ratio of steel fibers (0%, 1%, 1.5%) and joint transverse reinforcement amount. The test results show that maximum capacity, energy dissipation capacity, shear strength and bond condition are improved with the application of steel fibers to substitute transverse reinforcement of beam-column connections. Furthermore, several shear strength equations for exterior connections were examined, including the proposed equation for steel fiber-reinforced concrete exterior connections with non-seismic details.