Damage assessment of High Strength Reinforced Concrete Frames subjected to Cyclic Displacement-controlled Loading Condition using Applied Element Method

Abstract

Abstract When building structures are subjected to extreme loads, such as earthquakes, explosions, crane loads, natural calamities, etc., both the structural and non-structural components suffer significant damage. It is necessary to determine the magnitude of these damages and required to improve upcoming designs and take additional action for the damaged structures. High Strength Concrete (HSC) frames generally have smaller cross-sections of members with high strength and stiffness than Normal Strength Concrete (NSC), with non-structural components like masonry walls playing a crucial part. Masonry walls significantly further increase the stiffness and strength of these slender structures. But because of their brittle nature, structural and non-structural elements abruptly fail under heavy loading circumstances, causing further casualties. Numerous computational techniques, including FEM, XFEM, and DEM, were used better to understand the crack location of RC-framed infill masonry walls. However, these techniques could not identify adistinct damage pattern under extreme operating conditions. The Applied Element Method (AEM) has recently become a powerful numerical tool with acceptable accuracy and processing time for monitoring the development of structural cracks. This study uses AEM to analyse the damage patterns based on displacement-controlled in-plane cyclic loads on single- and multi-storey reinforced concrete frames with and without infill walls. The investigation concluded that the infilled frame has better in-plane lateral load resistance than the bare frame. The multi-storey soft-storey frame resisted a higher load than the multi-storey infilled frame because the slender HSC frames with strong infill induced rapid shear failure at the beam-column connection of the first floor. HSC structures are constantly challenged by the need for a robust infill wall to increase the stiffness of the frames. The AEM results showed that it provided a trustworthy endorsement of the experimental and theoretical findings.