State-of-the-Art of Research on Seismic Pounding Between Buildings with Aligned Slabs

Abstract

Collision between adjoining buildings with aligned slabs is relevant, since the huge impact forces significantly modify the buildings dynamic behavior. The separation required by the regulations avoids pounding; however, even in recent buildings, impact can occur due to not fulfillment of codes and seismicity underestimation. Given the importance of this issue, a significant research effort has been undertaken worldwide, and a considerable number of papers are available. The complexity of this field and this abundance of information might require a review task. This paper presents a summary of the theoretical developments, discusses the most common simulation software, provides an overview of the previous research, offers recommendations to researchers, and identifies research needs.

Letter to the Editor: Discussion on the Paper “State-of-the-Art of Research on Seismic Pounding Between Buildings with Aligned Slabs”

“…It is also difficult to agree with one of the conclusions of the paper [1] that 'in pounding simulation, it is basically suggested to utilize the normal Kelvin-Voigt model'. Well, the truth is that the normal Kelvin-Voigt model is a simple and quite accurate one.…”

“…It is difficult to agree with the sentence that 'the models based on the Hertz contact law are not adequate, since that law was derived for elastic contact between balls', as described in [1]. On the contrary to the above statement, the results of the analyses (see, for example [8]) indicate that the non-linear Hertz elastic model can be very effective in modelling earthquake-induced structural pounding when the loss of energy during collisions is not so significant.…”

“…The paper ''State-of-the-art of research on seismic pounding between buildings with aligned slabs'' (by Kharazian and López-Almansa) has recently been published in the journal of Archives of Computational Methods in Engineering (see [1]). It can be considered as a kind of continuation of previous 'state-of-the-art' publications, including two papers [2,3] and a book [4].…”

“…Unfortunately, the paper contains a number of misleading or wrong statements as well as mistakes. These errors are discussed and/or corrected below in the order they appear in paper [1].…”

“…It is a kind of misunderstanding to consider the classical theory of impact (stereomechanics) as a case of 'concentrated masses connected by a spring with infinitive stiffness', as described in [1]. Actually, the classical theory of impact is based on the laws of conservation of energy and momentum and does not consider stresses and deformations in the colliding elements during impact.…”