TITLE:
Study of Short Column Behavior Originated from the Level Difference on Sloping Lots during Earthquake (Special Case: Reinforced Concrete Buildings)
AUTHORS:
Keyvan Ramin, Foroud Mehrabpour
KEYWORDS:
Short Column; Reinforced Concrete; Level Difference; Slope; Earthquake
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Civil Engineering,
Vol.4 No.1,
February
27,
2014
ABSTRACT:
The disorders originated from
architectural design in buildings, show in different forms. One of them is the level difference originated from lot’s slope which affects structures through short column phenomenon. The great stiffness
of short columns enables them to absorb large amounts of structural energy.
Inattention of some manuals and regulations such as Earthquake regulations to
this phenomenon necessitates paying further attention to it. On this basis, the present study employed experimental modeling and
numerical modeling for a four-story reinforced concrete building that involves
the analysis of simple 2-D frames of varying floor heights and varying number of
bays using a very popular software tool STAAD Pro on both a sloping and a flat
lot. Also Sap2000 software had been used to show that the displacement of
floors is greater for a flat lot building than a sloping lot building. However,
the increase in shear was found to be quite greater in short columns compared
to common ones and an enormous moment should be tolerated by sloping lot
structures. The greater stiffness of the structure was also revealed by
non-linear static (Push-Over) analysis. According to the results, short column
are required to have more resistant sections and are suggested to be reinforced
with more bars. In addition, more steel should be used as stirrups than as
longitudinal bars. Also for existing structures, shear capacity of short columns
should be retrofitted by FRP, Steel Jacket or other materials.