Determination of ductility factor considering different hysteretic models

Abstract

In current seismic design procedures, base shear is calculated by the elastic strength demand divided by the strength reduction factor. This factor is well known as the response modification factor, R, which accounts for ductility, overstrength, redundancy, and damping of a structural system. In this study, the R factor accounting for ductility is called the ‘ductility factor’, Rμ. The Rμ factor is defined as the ratio of elastic strength demand imposed on the SDOF system to inelastic strength demand for a given ductility ratio. The Rμ factor allows a system to behave inelastically within the target ductility ratio during the design level earthquake ground motion. The objective of this study is to determine the ductility factor considering different hysteretic models. It usually requires large computational efforts to determine the Rμ factor. In order to reduce the computational efforts, the Rμ factor is prepared as a functional form in this study. For this purpose, statistical studies are carried out using forty different earthquake ground motions recorded at a stiff soil site. The Rμ factor is assumed to be a function of the characteristic parameters of each hysteretic model, target ductility ratio and structural period. The effects of each hysteretic model to the Rμ factor are also discussed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.