Seismic response of nonstructural components supported by a 4-story SMRF: Effect of nonlinear soil–structure interaction

Abstract

Previous studies have demonstrated that nonlinear material behavior of a building may lead to an increased seismic response of supported nonstructural components in comparison with the case when a linear material model is considered for the same building. It has also been demonstrated that this amplification of response of a nonstructural component due to nonlinear behavior of the building is more prominent when the frequency of the component is close to one of the higher modes of the building and the component is supported at a lower floor of the building. Those studies, however, did not consider the nonlinear soil–structure-interaction (SSI) that may occur during a strong earthquake. The present work investigates the effect of nonlinear SSI on seismic response of acceleration-sensitive nonstructural components attached to a four-story steel moment-resisting frame (SMRF). The results of this study show that the effect of nonlinear SSI is indeed beneficial to the response of the nonstructural components mounted on the chosen structure. In fact, if foundation–structure interface undergoes significant nonlinear deformations, the aforementioned response amplification of components due to structural nonlinearity can safely be ignored.