Seismic response of steel reinforced concrete spatial frame with irregular section columns under earthquake excitation

This paper presents some shaking table tests conducted on a 1/4-scaled model with 5-story steel reinforced concrete (SRC) spatial frame with irregular section columns under a series of base excitations with gradually increasing acceleration peaks. The test frame was subjected to a sequence of seismic simulation tests including 10 white noise vibrations and 51 seismic simulations. Each seismic simulation was associated with a different level of seismic disaster. Dynamic characteristic, strain response, acceleration response, displacement response, base shear and hysteretic behavior were analyzed. The test results demonstrate that at the end of the loading process, the failure mechanism of SRC frame with irregular section columns is the beam-hinged failure mechanism, which satisfies the seismic code of \"strong column-weak beam\". With the increase of acceleration peaks, accumulated damage of the frame increases gradually, which induces that the intrinsic frequency decreases whereas the damping ratio increases, and the peaks of acceleration and displacement occur later. During the loading process, torsion deformation appears and the base shear grows fast firstly and then slowly. The hysteretic curves are symmetric and plump, which shows a good capacity of energy dissipation. In summary, SRC frame with irregular section columns can satisfy the seismic requirements of \"no collapse under seldom earthquake\", which indicates that this structural system is suitable for the construction in the high seismic intensity zone.