Abstract
Past earthquakes demonstrate that non-structural elements could be vulnerable to a relatively low intensity ground shaking which induces negligible structural damage. The study aims to improve previously developed macro-models of cold-formed steel (CFS) partition walls to properly capture their in-plane cyclic response and damage states of important components in a CFS partition wall under imposed excitation. An effective analytical modelling approach is adopted for a simple modelling procedure and less computational effort. The proposed analysis model of partition walls consisting of several lumped spring elements is verified using direct comparison with two full scale CFS partition wall tests. The analytical and experimental results are compared in terms of force–displacement relations, dissipated energy, and an influential damage mechanism of components consisting of partition walls. The comparison shows that the analytical model well captures the experimental response such as the overall strength and stiffness degradation and pinching behavior. Moreover, the damage mechanism predicted by the analytical model is in good agreement with that observed during the tests.
Highlights
It has been demonstrated during past earthquakes that non-structural elements could be vulnerable to a relatively low intensity ground shaking which induces negligible structural damage [1,2,3].Reports on the investigation of earthquake-induced-loss, show that economic loss due to non-structural elements exceeds that due to structural members [4]
This study aims to propose a macro-analytical model for capturing in-plane responses of cold-formed steel (CFS) partition walls which can be constructed with a simple modelling procedure and less computational effort
A CFS partition wall generally consists of CFS framing members, and inner and outer wall panels which are made of gypsum boards (GBs)
Summary
It has been demonstrated during past earthquakes that non-structural elements could be vulnerable to a relatively low intensity ground shaking which induces negligible structural damage [1,2,3]. The global cyclic behavior of a CFS partition wall represented by a single lumped element can be captured, it is hard to estimate its local behavior and damage mechanism. Rahmanishamsi et al [17] suggested a more detailed analytical modelling, called a phenomenological model This model was constructed using nonlinear and/or linear multi-spring elements which can represent the main components of CFS partition walls and their connections. Similar to the models with a single lumped element, deterministic parameters are still needed to construct the hysteresis rules that should be determined by component-level experimental results of components and connections of a CFS partition wall. This study aims to propose a macro-analytical model for capturing in-plane responses of CFS partition walls which can be constructed with a simple modelling procedure and less computational effort. The analytical and experimental results are compared in terms of force–displacement relations, dissipated energy, and the influential damage mechanism of components of the partition walls
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