Drawing Recognition for Automatic Dimensioning of Shear-Walls

In computer-aided structural design, the drawing of shear-walls cannot be easily automated; however, dimensioning of the shear-walls provides a method to automate the drawing. This paper presents a drawing recognition method for automatic dimensioning of shear-walls. The regional relationship method includes a graphic shape template library that can learn new shear-wall shapes. The automatic dimensioning of shear-walls is then realized by matching the templates. The regional relationship method for graph recognition effectively describes the topological relationships for graphs to significantly increase the recognition efficiency.

Nonlinear numerical assessment of the seismic response of hillside RC buildings

Major damage has been reported in hilly areas after major earthquakes,primarily because of two special conditions:the variation in the seismic ground motion due to the inclined ground surface and the irregularities caused by a stepped base level in the structure.The aim of this study is to evaluate possible differences in the responses of Chilean hillside buildings through numerical linear-elastic and nonlinear analyses.In the first step,a set of response-spectrum analyses were performed on four simplified 2D structures with mean base inclination angles of 0°,15°,30°,and 45°.The structures were designed to comply with Chilean seismic codes and standards,and the primary response parameters were compared.To assess the seismic performance of the buildings,nonlinear static(pushover)and dynamic(time-history)analyses were performed with SeismoStruct software.Pushover analyses were used to compare the nonlinear response at the maximum roof displacement and the damage patterns.Time-history analyses were performed to assess the nonlinear dynamic response of the structures subjected to seismic ground motions modified by topographic effects.To consider the topographic modification,acceleration records were obtained from numerical models of soil,which were calculated using the rock acceleration record of the Mw 8.01985 Chilean earthquake.Minor differences in the structure responses(roof displacements and maximum element forces and moments)were caused by the topographic effects in the seismic input motion,with the highly predominant ones being the differences caused by the step-back configuration at the base of the structures.High concentrations of shear forces in short walls were observed,corresponding to the walls located in the upper zone of the foundation system.The response of the structures with higher angles was observed to be more prone to fragile failures due to the accumulation of shear forces.Even though hillside buildings gain stiffness in the lower stories,resulting in lower design roof displacement,maximum roof displacements for nonlinear time-history analyses remained very close for all the models that were primarily affected by the drifts of the lower stories.Additionally,vertical parasitic accelerations were considered for half the time-history analyses performed here.The vertical component seems to considerably modify the axial load levels in the shear walls on all stories.

High-Rise Residential Reinforced Concrete Building Optimisation

In the last few decades structure optimisation has become a main task in a civil engineering project. As a matter of fact, due to the complexity and particularity of every structure, the great amount of variables and design criteria to considerate and many other factors, a general optimisation’s method is not simple to formulate. As a result, this paper focuses on how to provide a successful optimisation method for a particular building type, high-rise reinforced concrete buildings. The optimization method is based on decomposition of the main structure into substructures: floor system, vertical load resisting system, lateral load resisting system and foundation system;then each of the subsystems using the design criteria established at the building codes is improved. Due to the effect of the superstructure optimisation on the foundation system, vertical and lateral load resisting system is the last to be considered after the improvement of floor. Finally, as a case example, using the method explained in the paper, a 30-story-high high-rise residential building complex is analysed and optimised, achieving good results in terms of structural behaviour and diminishing the overall cost of the structure.

A new damage quantification approach for shear-wall buildings using ambient vibration data

This paper presents a new approach to estimate damage seventy tor slaear-wall DUlltllngs using alagona~ terms of a modal flexibility matrix estimated from dynamic properties. This study aims to provide a fundamental concept for quantifying the damage of realistic buildings by investigating an idealized shear-wall building. Numerical studies were performed on a 5-story shear-wall building model to validate the applicability of the presented approach, using two damage patterns. With the numerical simulations, the proposed approach accurately determined the damage ratio of the specimens. Experiments were also conducted on a 5-story shear-wall building model for which the system parameters were almost the same as those in numerical simulations. The estimated damage-quantification results from the experimental validations demonstrated that the performance of the presented method for shear-wall buildings was both suitable and accurate.