• Steel and Composite Structures
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• 제30권3호
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• pp.271-280
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• 2019

In this paper, numerical and experimental assessments have been conducted in order to investigate the capability of using CFRP for the seismic capacity improvement and relocation of plastic hinge in reinforced concrete connections. Two scaled down exterior reinforced concrete beam to column connections have been used. These two connections from a strengthened moment frame have been tested under uniformly distributed load before and after optimization. The results of experimental tests have been used to verify the accuracy of numerical modeling using computational ABAQUS software. Application of FRP plate on the web of the beam in connections to improve its capacity is of interest in this paper. Several parametric studies were carried out for CFRP reinforced samples, with different lengths and thicknesses in order to relocate the plastic hinge away from the face of the column.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제16권2호
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• pp.165-175
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• 2019

Incremental dynamic analysis (IDA), as an accurate method to evaluate the parameters of structural performance levels, requires many non-linear time history analyses, using a set of ground motion records which are scaled to different intensity levels. Therefore, this method is very computationally demanding. In this study, a new method is presented to estimate the summarized (16%, 50%, and 84% fractiles) IDA curves of a first-mode dominated structure using discrete wavelet transform and bees optimization algorithm. This method reduces the number of required ground motion records for the prediction of the summarized IDA curves. At first, a subset of first list ground motion records is decomposed by means of discrete wavelet transform which have a low dispersion estimating the summarized IDA curves of equivalent SDOF system of the main structure. Then, the bees algorithm optimizes a series of factors for each level of detail coefficients in discrete wavelet transform. The applied factors change the frequency content of original ground motion records which the generated ground motions records can be utilized to reliably estimate the summarized IDA curves of the main structure. At the end, to evaluate the efficiency of the proposed method, the seismic behavior of a typical 3-story special steel moment frame, subjected to a set of twenty ground motion records is compared with this method.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제23권1호
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• pp.87-100
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• 2022

Limiting the displacement of seismic isolators causes a pounding phenomenon under severe earthquakes. Therefore, the ASCE 7-16 has provided minimum criteria for the design of the isolated building. In this research the seismic response of isolated buildings by Triple Friction Pendulum Isolator (TFPI) under the impact, expected, and unexpected mass eccentricity was evaluated. Also, the effect of different design parameters on the seismic behavior of structural and nonstructural elements was found. For this, a special steel moment frame structure with a surrounding moat wall was designed according to the criteria, by considering different response modification coefficients (RI), and 20% mass eccentricity in one direction. Then, different values of these parameters and the damping of the base isolation were evaluated. The results show that the structural elements have acceptable behavior after impact, but the nonstructural components are placed in a moderate damage range after impact and the used improved methods could not ameliorate the level of damage. The reduction in the RI and the enhancement of the isolator's damping are beneficial up to a certain point for improving the seismic response after impact. The moat wall reduces torque and maximum absolute acceleration (MAA) due to unexpected enhancement of mass eccentricity. However, drifts of some stories increase. Also, the difference between the response of story drift by expected and unexpected mass eccentricity is less. This indicates that the minimum requirement displacement according to ASCE 7-16 criteria lead to acceptable results under the unexpected enhancement of mass eccentricity.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제69권3호
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• pp.257-268
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• 2019

Infills are as important members in structural design as beams, columns and braces. They have significant effect on structural behavior. Because of lots of variables in infills like material non-linear behavior, the interaction between frames and infill, etc., the infills performance during an earthquake is complicated, so have led designers do not consider the effect of infills in designing the structure. However, the experimental studies revealed that the infills have the remarkable effect on structure behavior. As if these effects ignored, it might occur soft-story phenomena, torsion or short-column effects on the structures. One simple and appropriate method for considering the infills effects in analyzing, is replacing the infills with diagonal compression strut with the same performance of real infill, instead of designing the whole infill. Because of too many uncertainties, codes and researchers gave many expressions that were not as the same as the others. The major intent of this paper is calculation the width of this diagonal strut, which has the most characteristics of infill. This paper by comprehensive on different parameters like the modulus of young or moment of inertia of columns presents a new formula for achieving the equivalent strut width. In fact, this new formula is extracted from about 60 FEM analyses models. It can be said that this formula is very efficient and accurate in estimating the equivalent strut width, considering the large number of effective parameters relative to similar relationships provided by other researchers. In most cases, the results are so close to the values obtained by the FEM. In this formula, the effect of out of plane buckling is neglected and this formula is used just in steel structures. Also, the thickness of infill panel, and the lateral force applied to frame are constant. In addition, this new formula is just for modeling the lateral stiffness. Obtaining the nearest response in analyzing is important to the designers, so this new formula can help them to reach more accurate response among a lot of experimental equations proposed by researchers.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• 제42권4호
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• pp.501-511
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• 2022

Earthquake Resistant Design Philosophy seeks (a) no damage, (b) no significant structural damage, and (c) significant structural damage but no collapse of normal buildings, under minor, moderate and severe levels of earthquake shaking, respectively. A procedure is proposed for seismic design of low-rise reinforced concrete special moment frame buildings, which is consistent with this philosophy; buildings are designed to be ductile through appropriate sizing and reinforcement detailing, such that they resist severe level of earthquake shaking without collapse. Nonlinear analyses of study buildings are used to determine quantitatively (a) ranges of design parameters required to assure the required deformability in normal buildings to resist the severe level of earthquake shaking, (b) four specific limit states that represent the start of different structural damage states, and (c) levels of minor and moderate earthquake shakings stated in the philosophy along with an extreme level of earthquake shaking associated with the structural damage state of no collapse. The four limits of structural damage states and the three levels of earthquake shaking identified are shown to be consistent with the performance-based design guidelines available in literature. Finally, nonlinear analyses results are used to confirm the efficacy of the proposed procedure.