In this paper, a novel structural modification approach has been adopted to eliminate the early coupling between the bending and torsional mode shapes of vibrations for a cable stayed bridge model generated using ABAQUS software. Two lateral steel beams are added to the middle span of the structure. Frequency analysis is dedicated to obtain the natural frequencies of the first eight mode shapes of vibrations before and after the structural modification approach. Numerical simulations of wind excitations are conducted for the 3D model of the cable stayed bridge with duration of 30 s supporting on real data of a strong wind from the literature. Both vertical and torsional displacements are calculated at the mid span of the deck to analyze both the bending and the torsional stiffness of the system before and after the structural modification. The results of the frequency analysis after applying lateral steel beams declared a safer structure against vertical and torsional vibrations and rarely expected flutter wind speed. Furthermore, the coupling between the vertical and torsional mode shapes has been removed to larger natural frequencies magnitudes with a high factor of safety. The novel structural approach manifested great efficiency in increasing vertical and torsional stiffness of the structure.
Light-frame timber buildings are often stabilized against lateral loads by using diaphragm action of roofs, floors and walls. The mechanical behavior of the sheathing-to-framing joints has a significant impact on the structural performance of shear walls. Most sheathing-to-framing joints show nonlinear load-displacement characteristics with plastic behavior. This paper is focused on the finite element modeling of shear walls. The purpose is to present a new shear connector element based on the theory of continuum plasticity. The incremental load-displacement relationship is derived based on the elastic-plastic stiffness tensor including the elastic stiffness tensor, the plastic modulus, a function representing the yield criterion and a hardening rule, and function representing the plastic potential. The plastic properties are determined from experimental results obtained from testing actual connections. Load-displacement curves for shear walls are calculated using the shear connector model and they are compared with experimental and other computational results. Also, the ultimate horizontal load-carrying capacity is compared to results obtained by an analytical plastic design method. Good agreements are found.
A push-out test program was designed and conducted to study the meso-scale behavior of mortar-aggregate interface for concrete after elevated temperatures ranging from 20°C to 600°C with the concept of modeled concrete (MC) and modeled recycled aggregate concrete (MRAC). The MCs and MRACs were designed with different strength grade of mortar and were exposed to different elevated temperatures. Following that the specimens were cooled to room temperature and push-out tests were conducted. Failure process and mechanical behaviors were analyzed based on failure modes, residual load-displacement curves, residual peak loads and peak displacements. It is found that failure modes significantly depended on specimen type, the elevated temperature and the strength grade of mortar. For MC, major cracks started to propagate along the initial cracks caused by elevated temperatures at about 80% of residual peak load. For MRAC, the cracks appeared at a lower level of load with the increasing elevated temperatures. The cracks connected with each other, formed a failure face and the specimens were split into several parts suddenly when reaching the residual peak load. Residual load-displacement curves of different specimens had similarities in shape. Besides, effect of temperatures and strength grade of mortar on residual peak load and peak displacement were analyzed. For MC and MRAC with higher strength of new hardened mortar, the residual peak load kept constant when the temperature is lower than 400°C and dropped by 43.5% on average at 600°C. For MRAC with lower strength of new hardened mortar, the residual peak load began to reduce when the temperatures exceeded 200°C and reduced by 27.4% and 60.8% respectively at 400°C and 600°C. The properties of recycled aggregate concrete (RAC) may be more sensitive to elevated temperatures than those of natural aggregate concrete (NAC) due to the fact that the interfacial properties of RAC are lower than those of NAC, and are deteriorated at lower temperatures.
Fragility curves are commonly used in civil engineering to assess the vulnerability of structures to earthquakes. The probability of failure associated with a prescribed criterion (e.g., the maximal inter-storey drift of a building exceeding a certain threshold) is represented as a function of the intensity of the earthquake ground motion (e.g., peak ground acceleration or spectral acceleration). The classical approach relies on assuming a lognormal shape of the fragility curves; it is thus parametric. In this paper, we introduce two non-parametric approaches to establish the fragility curves without employing the above assumption, namely binned Monte Carlo simulation and kernel density estimation. As an illustration, we compute the fragility curves for a three-storey steel frame using a large number of synthetic ground motions. The curves obtained with the non-parametric approaches are compared with respective curves based on the lognormal assumption. A similar comparison is presented for a case when a limited number of recorded ground motions is available. It is found that the accuracy of the lognormal curves depends on the ground motion intensity measure, the failure criterion and most importantly, on the employed method for estimating the parameters of the lognormal shape.
Identifying the morphology of rock blocks is vital to accurate modelling of rock mass structures. This paper applies the concepts of directed edges and vertex chain operations which are typical for block tracing approach to block assembling approach to construct the structure of three-dimensional fractured rock masses. Polygon subtraction and union algorithms that rely merely on vertex chain operation are proposed, which allow a fast and convenient construction of complex faces/loops. Apart from its robustness in dealing with finite discontinuities and complex geometries, the advantages of the current methodology in tackling some challenging issues associated with the morphological analysis of rock blocks are addressed. In particular, the identification of complex blocks with interior voids such as cavity, pit and torus can be readily achieved based on the number and the type of loops. The improved morphology visualization approach can benefit the pre-processing stage when analyzing the stability of rock masses subject to various engineering impacts using the block theory and the discrete element method.
This paper presents a literature review focused on the material performance of cold-formed, carbon steel, hollow structural sections under impulsive (highly dynamic) loading. Impulsive loading, represented by impact and blast, is characterized by a very rapid, time-dependent loading regime in the affected members and materials. Thus, the effect of high-strain-rate loading is initially reviewed. Next the material toughness, an important energy-absorption property and one measure of a material’s ability to arrest fracture, is considered by means of studying the Charpy V-notch behavior. The response of hollow sections under axial and lateral impact loading is then reviewed. ??Studies of blast on hollow sections, most of which fall under the categories of contact/near-field loading or far-field loading are presented. Under large-scale field blast experiments, cold-formed hollow sections have shown excellent behavior. Software for modeling blast loading and structural response, the latter including single degree of freedom analysis and explicit finite element analysis, is described and discussed.
In this study, an attempt is made to determine the interaction effect of two closely spaced strip footings using Pasternak model. The study considers small strain problem and has been performed using linear as well as nonlinear elastic analysis to determine the interaction effect of two nearby strip footings. The hyperbolic stress-strain relationship has been considered for the nonlinear elastic analysis. The linear elastic analysis has been carried out by deriving the equations for the interference effect of the footings in the framework of Pasternak model equation; whereas, the nonlinear elastic analysis has been performed using the finite difference method to solve the second order nonlinear differential equation evolved from Pasternak model with proper boundary conditions. Results obtained from the linear and the nonlinear elastic analysis are presented in terms of non-dimensional interaction factors by varying different parameters like width of the foundation, load on the foundation and the depth of the rigid base. Results are suitably compared with the existing values in the literature.
Structural dynamic characteristics are the most significant parameters that play a decisive role in structural damage assessment. The more sensitive parameter to the damage is the damping behavior of the structure. The complexity of structural damping mechanisms has made this parameter to be one of the ongoing research topics. Despite all the difficulties in the modeling of damping, there are some approaches like as linear and nonlinear models which are described as the energy dissipation throughout viscous, material or structural hysteretic and frictional damping mechanisms. In the presence of a mathematical model of the damping mechanisms, it is possible to estimate the damping ratio from the theoretical comparison of the damped and un-damped systems. On the other hand, solving the inverse problem of the input force estimation and its distribution to each SDOFs, from the measured structural responses plays an important role in structural identification process. In this paper model-based damping approximation method and a model-less structural input estimation are considered. The effectiveness of proposed methods has been carried out through analytical and numerical simulation of the lumped mass system and the results are compared with reference data. Consequently, high convergence of the comparison results illustrates the satisfactory of proposed approximation methods.