Seismic Damage Analysis and Damage-Limiting Design for R/c Structures (Earthquake, Building, Reliability, Design)

Abstract

A model for evaluating structural damage in reinforced concrete structures under earthquake ground motions is proposed. Damage is expressed as a linear combination of the maximum deformation and the effect of repeated cyclic loadings. Available static (monotonic) and dynamic (cyclic) test data were analyzed to evaluate the statistics of the appropriate parameters of the proposed model. Accordingly, a method of nonlinear random vibration technique was developed for obtaining the response statistics necessary for damage assessment.

From an extensive damage analysis of various reinforced concrete buildings, an intensity scale was derived to describe the potential destructiveness of ground motion. It is a simple function of the rms acceleration and strong-motion duration. The proposed damage model is calibrated with observed building damages from past earthquakes. On this basis, a design procedure is developed accordingly to limit the potential structural damage to a tolerable level.