ENERGY ABSORPTION IN LARGE PANEL STRUCTURAL JOINTS

Abstract

With regard to large-panel prefabricated buildings, it is commonly accepted today that during a major earthquake, the panels remain “elastic” while the dynamic load is mainly taken up by the joints which function it is to ensure the stability of the structure. The panels are connected by horizontal and vertical joints within a shearwall, which may be regarded as a system of vertical cantilevers each consisting of several panels connected by horizontal joints. The transfer of dynamic load between the cantilevers induces shear in both vertical and horizontal joints. The principal properties of the “conventional” key-joint, and its behavior under static and dynamic loading - as they appear in various papers - are briefed. The vertical lock-joint, whose behavior is less known in literature, is analyzed. A mathematical model for its absorption of energy and the validity of this model is established. The same procedure is applied for the horizontal joint between the panel and the floor-slab. The correspondence between the mathematical model of absorption of energy in horizontal joint and the experimental data is found to be good. Finally, the absorption of energy in large panel structural joints is analyzed in different stages of loading and the limits of application of the established models is determined.