Lateral stiffness of steel plate shear walls

The steel plate shear wall system has been used in a number of buildings as an innovative lateral force resistant system.Openings often exist in the steel plate shear walls due to the various functional requirements of structures.These openings may negatively impact the lateral stiffness of steel plate shear walls.Therefore,an experimental research was instituted to investigate the seismic behavior of steel plate shear walls,with and without openings.The experimental results showed that steel plate shear walls have the satisfying seismic behavior,and,as expected,the strength and stiffness characteristics of the walls were reduced due to openings.Then a single-story wall panel FE model and an analytical deep beam model are developed in order to find the critical factors dominating the thickness reduction coefficient of wall panels with the opening.Furthermore,extensive parametric analysis is conducted to derive a simplified formula for the determination of the thickness reduction coefficient of wall panels with the opening for substituting solid wall panels with reduced thickness for actual wall panels with the opening.Finally,the design method for calculating the lateral stiffness is verified by some experimental programs and recommended for the routine practice of steel plate shear walls.

Lateral magnetic stiffness under different parameters in a high-temperature superconductor levitation system

Magnetic stiffness determines the stability of a high-temperature superconductor(HTS)magnetic levitation system.The quantitative properties of the physical and geometrical parameters that affect the stiffness of HTS levitation systems should be identified for improving the stiffness by some effective methods.The magnetic stiffness is directly related to the first-order derivative of the magnetic force with respect to the corresponding displacement,which indicates that the effects of the parameters on the stiffness should be different from the relationships between the forces and the same parameters.In this paper,we study the influences of some physical and geometrical parameters,including the strength of the external magnetic field(B0)produced by a rectangular permanent magnet(PM),critical current density(Jc),the PM-to-HTS area ratio(α),and thickness ratio(β),on the lateral stiffness by using a numerical approach under zero-field cooling(ZFC)and field cooling(FC)conditions.In the first and second passes of the PM,the lateral stiffness at most of lateral positions essentially increases with B0 increasing and decreases withβincreasing in ZFC and FC.The largest lateral stiffness at every lateral position is almost produced by the minimum value of Jc,which is obviously different from the lateral force–Jc relation.Theα-dependent lateral stiffness changes with some parameters,which include the cooling conditions of the bulk HTS,lateral displacement,and movement history of the PM.These findings can provide some suggestions for improving the lateral stiffness of the HTS levitation system.

Distortional buckling analysis of steel-concrete composite box beams considering effect of stud rotational restraint under hogging moment

Restrained distortional buckling is an important buckling mode of steel-concrete composite box beams(SCCBB)under the hogging moment.Rotational and lateral deformation restraints of the bottom plate by the webs are essential factors affecting SCCBB distortional buckling.Based on the stationary potential energy principle,the analytical expressions for the rotational restraint stiffness(RRS)of the web upper edge as well as the RRS and the lateral restraint stiffness(LRS)of the bottom plate were derived.Also,the SCCBB critical moment formula under the hogging moment was derived.Using twenty specimens,the theoretical calculation method is compared with the finite-element method.Results indicate that the theoretical calculation method can effectively and accurately reflect the restraint effect of the studs,top steel flange,and other factors on the bottom plate.Both the RRS and the LRS have a nonlinear coupling relationship with the external loads and the RRS of the web’s upper edge.Under the hogging moment,the RRS of the web upper edge has a certain influence on the SCCBB distortional buckling critical moment.With increasing RRS of the web upper edge,the SCCBB critical moment increases at first and then tends to be stable.

Capacity and failure mechanism of laterally loaded jet-grouting reinforced piles: Field and numerical investigation

This study presents the results of field and numerical investigations of lateral stiffness, capacity, and failure mechanisms for plain piles and reinforced concrete piles in soft clay. A plastic-damage model is used to simulate concrete piles and jet-grouting in the numerical analyses. The field study and numerical investigations show that by applying jet-grouting sur- rounding the upper 7.5D （D = pile diameter） of a pile, lateral stiffness and beating capacity of the pile are increased by about 110% and 100%, respectively. This is partially because the jet-grouting increases the apparent diameter of the pile, so as to en- large the extent of failure wedge and hence passive resistance in front of the reinforced pile. Moreover, the jet-grouting pro- vides a circumferential confinement to the concrete pile, which suppresses development of tensile stress in the pile. Corre- spondingly, tension-induced plastic damage in the concrete pile is reduced, causing less degradation of stiffness and strength of the pile than that of a plain pile. Effectiveness of the circumferential confinement provided by the jet-grouting, however, diminishes once the grouting cracks because of the significant vertical and circumferential tensile stress near its mid-depth. The lateral capacity of the jet-grouting reinforced pile is, therefore, governed by mobilized passive resistance of soil and plastic damage of jet-grouting.