Parametric study on probabilistic local seismic demand of IBBC connection using finite element reliability method

This paper aims to probabilistically evaluate performance of two types of I beam to box column (IBBC) connection. With the objective of considering the variability of seismic loading demand, statistical features of the inter-story drift ratio corresponding to the second, fifth and eleventh story of a 12-story steel special moment resisting frames are extracted through incremental dynamic analysis at global collapse state. Variability of geometrical variables and material strength are also taken into account. All of these random variables are exported as inputs to a probabilistic finite element model which simulates the connection. At the end, cumulative distribution functions of local seismic demand for each component of each connection are provided using histogram sampling. Through a parametric study on probabilistic local seismic demand, the influence of some geometrical random variables on the performance of IBBC connections is demonstrated. Furthermore, the probabilistic study revealed that IBBC connection with widened flange has a better performance than the un-widened flange. Also, a design procedure is proposed for WF connections to achieve a same connection performance in different stories.