Stiffness configuration of strongbacks to mitigate inter-story drift concentration in buildings

Post‐earthquake system identification and response estimation of an elastic compound building using a simplified numerical model

“…The deformation in such an extreme case should be close to a pure shear type, which could be useful for understanding why the identified α was equal to one. It is also interesting to compare the α value of the extended building with that of a three-story building that has a soft 1st story and a relatively stiff 3rd story, with RC walls only added to the 3rd story, as presented by Lin et al 9 This three-story building, whose stiffness distribution trend is opposite to that of the extended building, was designed to simulate buildings with elevated bottom stories used for parking lots or stores and upper stories with RC walls used for residences. By matching the mode shapes of the GBM with those of the FEM, the value of α for the three-story building was found to be 0.16.…”

“…This three‐story building, whose stiffness distribution trend is opposite to that of the extended building, was designed to simulate buildings with elevated bottom stories used for parking lots or stores and upper stories with RC walls used for residences. By matching the mode shapes of the GBM with those of the FEM, the value of α for the three‐story building was found to be 0.16 9 . This comparison may be useful in highlighting the point that the deformation type of a building is affected not only by the number of RC walls but also by their distribution.…”

“…In addition, because of the continuously distributed mass along the beam length, the continuous beam model can be unsuitable for simulating low‐rise buildings. To maintain the integrity of the present paper and avoid duplication, the GBM is briefly introduced below, and the reader is referred to the literature for its associated derivations 7–9 …”

“…In addition, even if the FEM is available, it is still difficult to carry out effective adjustments when the measured responses are not consistent with the responses estimated using the FEM. In light of the simplicity and versatility of the generalized building model (GBM), [7][8][9] the present study employs the GBM, an N-DOF stick model, as the simplified numerical counterpart of an actual N-story building. The concept of the GBM arose from a continuous beam model (Figure 1A), which consists of two continuous beams (one shear beam and one flexural beam).…”

“…To maintain the integrity of the present paper and avoid duplication, the GBM is briefly introduced below, and the reader is referred to the literature for its associated derivations. [7][8][9]…”