The Earthquake Engineering Online Archive

Experimental study of seismic response of R.C. setback buildings

Shahrooz, Bahram M.; Moehle, Jack P.

UCB/EERC-87/16, Earthquake Engineering Research Center, University of California, Berkeley, 1987-10, 360 pages (530/S476/1987)

The design, construction, and testing of a 1/4-scale model of a two-bay, six-story reinforced concrete ductile moment-resisting frame having 50 percent setback at the mid-height are described. The prototype structure was designed according to the requirements of the 1982 Uniform Building Code, the American Concrete Inst. Building Code, and the American Concrete Inst.-American Society of Civil Engineers Committee 352 recommendations for design of beam-column connections. The structure was subjected to static pull-back tests, free vibration tests, and unidirectional and bidirectional earthquake simulations performed on the shaking table at the Earthquake Engineering Research Center, Univ. of California at Berkeley. The experimental findings from the response of the test structure were extended to a broad spectrum of response of setback frames. Interpretations of the measured response and correlations obtained from three-dimensional elastic analysis and two-dimensional inelastic static and dynamic analyses are presented. Current provisions for seismic design of ductile reinforced concrete structures are evaluated. A method is presented by which potential concentration of damage in tower members of a setback building can be identified. A static analysis technique is proposed for design of setback structures.

Available online: http://nisee.berkeley.edu/documents/EERC/EERC-87-16.pdf (22 MB)