Quantification of Vertical Irregularities for Earthquake Resistant Reinforced Concrete Buildings

Abstract

In modern urban construction, irregular buildings are increasingly constructed to fulfill architectural and functional requirements. However, these buildings revealed unfavorable seismic performance during the past earthquake records. When the seismic design codes deal with the issue of building irregularity, little attention is paid to the location of irregularity. In the current study, a detailed structural analysis was performed to investigate the effects of the location of mass, stiffness, setback, and combined irregularities on the structural seismic response of twelve irregular building models. Based on the dynamic properties of the building, an irregularity index is proposed to quantify the effects of the magnitude and location of various types of vertical irregularities. The proposed index was able to successfully quantify all types of vertical irregularities.

Keywords

• earthquake engineering
• seismic design
• dynamic analysis
• moment-resisting frames
• irregularity
• irregularity index