• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제12권2호
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• pp.251-262
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• 2017

The present research intends to study the effects of the seismic soil-foundation-structure interaction (SFSI) on the dynamic response of various buildings. Two methods including direct and Cone model were studied through 3D finite element method using ABAQUS software. Cone model as an approximate method to consider the SFSI phenomenon was developed and evaluated for both high and low rise buildings. Effect of soil nonlinearity, foundation rigidity and embedment as well as friction coefficient between soil-foundation interfaces during seismic excitation are investigated. Validity and performance of both approaches are evaluated as reference graphs for Cone model and infinite boundary condition, soil nonlinearity and amplification factor for direct method. A series of calculations by DeepSoil for inverse earthquake record modification was conducted. A comparison of the two methods was carried out by root-mean-square-deviation (RMSD) tool for maximum lateral displacement and story shear forces which verifies that Cone model results have good agreement with direct method. It was concluded that Cone method is a convenient, fast and rather accurate method as an approximate way to count for soil media.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제30권2호
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• pp.211-223
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• 2008

A number of studies have suggested that the use of high ductile and high shear materials, such as Engineered Cementitious Composites (ECC) and High Performance Fiber Reinforced Cementitious Composites (HPFRCC), significantly enhances the shear capacity of structural elements, even with/without shear reinforcements. The present study emphasizes the development of a nonlinear model of shear behaviour of a HPFRCC panel for application to the seismic retrofit of reinforced concrete buildings. To model the shear behaviour of HPFRCC panels, the original Modified Compression Field Theory (MCFT) for conventional reinforced concrete panels has been newly revised for reinforced HPFRCC panels, and is referred to here as the HPFRCC-MCFT model. A series of experiments was conducted to assess the shear behaviour of HPFRCC panels subjected to pure shear, and the proposed shear model has been verified through an experiment involving panel elements under pure shear. The proposed shear model of a HPFRCC panel has been applied to the prediction of seismic retrofitted reinforced concrete buildings with in-filled HPFRCC panels. In retrofitted structures, the in-filled HPFRCC element is regarded as a shear spring element of a low-rise shear wall ignoring the flexural response, and reinforced concrete elements for beam or beam-column member are modelled by a finite plastic hinge zone model. An experimental study of reinforced concrete frames with in-filled HPFRCC panels was also carried out and the analysis model was verified with correlation studies of experimental results.

• Wind and Structures
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• 제31권4호
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• pp.335-350
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• 2020

In coastal residential communities, especially along the coastline, flooding is a frequent natural hazard that impacts the area. To reduce the adverse effects of flooding, it is recommended to elevate coastal buildings to a certain safe level. However, post storm damage assessment has revealed severe damages sustained by elevated buildings' components such as roofs, walls, and floors. By elevating a structure and creating air gap underneath the floor, the wind velocity increases and the aerodynamics change. This results in varying wind loading and pressure distribution that are different from their slab on grade counterparts. To fill the current knowledge gap, a large-scale aerodynamic wind testing was conducted at the Wall of Wind experimental facility to evaluate the wind pressure distribution over the surfaces of a low-rise gable roof single-story elevated house. The study considered three different stilt heights. This paper presents the observed changes in local and area averaged peak pressure coefficients for the building surfaces of the studied cases. The aerodynamics of the elevated structures are explained. Comparisons are done with ASCE 7-16 and AS/NZS 1170.2 wind loading standards. For the floor surface, the study suggests a wind pressure zoning and pressure coefficients for each stilt height.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제10권6호
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• pp.1315-1330
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• 2016

This study investigates ground motion parameters and their damage potential for building type structures. It focuses on low and mid-rise reinforced concrete buildings that are important portion of the existing building stock under seismic risk in many countries. Correlations of 19 parameters of 466 earthquake records with nonlinear displacement demands of 1056 Single Degree of Freedom (SDOF) systems are investigated. Properties of SDOF systems are established to represent RC building construction practice. The correlation of damage and ground motion characteristics is examined with respect to number of story and site classes. Equations for average nonlinear displacement demands of considered RC buildings are given for some of the ground motion parameters. Velocity related parameters are generally found to have better results than the acceleration, displacement and frequency related ones. Correlation of the parameters may be expected to decrease with increasing intensity of seismic event. Velocity Spectrum Intensity and Peak Ground Velocity have been found to have the highest correlation values for almost all site classes and number of story groups. Common parameter of Peak Ground Acceleration has lower correlation with damage when compared to them and some other parameters like Effective Design Acceleration and Characteristic Intensity.

• Wind and Structures
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• 제22권2호
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• pp.133-160
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• 2016

Hurricanes are among the most costly natural hazards to impact buildings in coastal regions. Building roofs are designed using the wind load provisions of building codes and standards and, in the case of large buildings, wind tunnel tests. Wind permeable roof claddings like roof pavers are not well dealt with in many existing building codes and standards. The objective of this paper is to develop simple guidance in code format for design of loose-laid roof pavers. Large-scale experiments were performed to investigate the wind loading on concrete roof pavers on the flat roof of a low-rise building in Wall of Wind, a large-scale hurricane testing facility at Florida International University. They included wind blow-off tests and pressure measurements on the top and bottom surfaces of pavers. Based on the experimental results simplified guidelines are developed for design of loose-laid roof pavers against wind uplift. The guidelines are formatted so that use can be made of the existing information in codes and standards such as American Society of Civil Engineering (ASCE) 7-10 standard's pressure coefficients for components and cladding. The effects of the pavers' edge-gap to spacer height ratio and parapet height to building height ratio are included in the guidelines as adjustment factors.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제86권1호
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• pp.29-48
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• 2023

Pounding happens when contiguous structures with differing heights vibrate out of line caused by a seismic activity. The situation is aggravated due to the insufficient separation gap between the structures which can lead to the crashing of the buildings or total collapse of an edifice. Countries around the world have compiled building standards to address the pounding issue. One of the strategies recommended is the introduction of the separation gap between structures. AS1170.4-2007 is an Australian standard that requires 1% of the building height as a minimum separation gap between buildings to preclude pounding. This article presents experimental and numerical tests to determine the adequacy of this specification to prevent the occurrence of seismic pounding between steel frame structures under near-field and far-field earthquakes. The results indicated that the recommended minimum separation gap based on the Australian Standard is inaccurate if low-rise structure in a coupled case is utilised under both near and far field earthquakes. The standard is adequate if a tall building is involved but only when a far-field earthquake happens. The research likewise presents results derived by using the ABS and SRSS methods.

• 한국실내디자인학회논문집
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• 제15권3호
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• pp.48-55
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• 2006

A sustainable building must produce an interior environment that is safe, healthy, comfortable and supportive of human performance and well-being. The medical human comfort: performance and productivity cost of unhealthy environment may cause much cost for healing. Research that buildings with daylight, fresh air, eco-materials and sustainable interior design are consistently rated as more comfortable and occupants performance, satisfaction and health. This study is to categorize systematically interior environmental design elements for improving sustainability with a view to developing an evaluation model of super high-rise apartment unit plans. With a literature survey and design guide lines concerning sustainable design elements, three hierarchical categorization levels of human, environment, energy and resources systems that consists of upper, middle, low design elements have been proposed. A total of 6 items have been suggested for middle level of categorization and 24 items for lower level. Finally a total of 107 design elements concerning the 24 items and their relationahips have been revealed. The needs for a systematic approach to interior environmental design for sustainability have been discussed.

• Wind and Structures
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• 제35권5호
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• pp.297-307
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• 2022

Over the past few decades, the use of wind tunnels has been increasing as a result of the rapid growth of cities and the urge to build taller and non-typical structures. While the accuracy of a wind tunnel study on a tall building requires several aspects, the precise extraction of wind pressure plays a significant role in a successful pressure test. In this research study, a low-cost expandable synchronous multi-pressure sensing system (SMPSS) was developed and validated at Ryerson University's wind tunnel (RU-WT) using electronically scanning pressure sensors for wind tunnel tests. The pressure system consists of an expandable 128 pressure sensors connected to a compact data acquisition and a host workstation. The developed system was examined and validated to be used for tall buildings by comparing mean, root mean square (RMS), and power spectral density (PSD) for the base moments coefficients with the available data from the literature. In addition, the system was examined for evaluating the mean and RMS pressure distribution on a standard low-rise building and were found to be in good agreement with the validation data.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제19권3호
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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.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• 제7권2호
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• pp.153-167
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• 2011

The Subspace based System Identification Techniques (SSIT) have been very popular within the research circles in the last decade due to their proven superiority over the other existing system identification techniques. For operational (output only) modal analysis, the stochastic SSIT and for operational modal analysis in the presence of exogenous inputs, the combined deterministic stochastic SSIT have been used in the literature. This study compares the application of the two alternative techniques on a typical school building in Istanbul using 100 Monte Carlo simulations. The study clearly shows that the combined deterministic stochastic SSIT performs superior to the stochastic SSIT when the techniques are applied on noisy data from low to mid rise stiff structures.